We bid goodbye to Slovenia for a side jaunt into Italy. Having been in Europe for well over three weeks by this point, we were allowed into the country without quarantining (not the case had we come directly from the UK). Given that freedom it seemed rude not to take them up on the opportunity! We also had the perfect destination in mind. Hotel Emilia was a particularly memorable stop on a previous Italian jaunt and, ever since, we had been mulling options for going back there. But the distance was too much to do in one day so we needed somewhere on the north Adriatic coast to break the journey. My brother suggested Soave and it proved to be the perfect place. Our Airbnb was small but perfectly formed and highly recommended. We had a mountain of washing from the past three weeks and were heading to another hotel so we definitely made the most of the facilities! We may have blotted our copybook slightly by drinking a bottle of Slovenian wine brought with us from Ferdinand, rather than sampling the local wine, but we can get Soave in the UK. Rebula, not so much. Soave itself is very pretty and worth a day or two of mooching. We even managed to fit in a cycle jaunt taking in the surrounding area, with just the right amount of ascent, as well as route diversions!
Clothes cleaned and suitcases repacked, it was time to press on to the west coast of the Adriatic and the gorgeous Hotel Emilia for a week of relaxation and beachy fun. The week consisted of kayaking, swimming and snorkelling in the sea, mooching around the excellent town of Sirolo which we discovered by accident when looking for somewhere to eat one evening, and even a cycling trip into Ancona itself – taking on the Italian traffic on two wheels! We do love Italy but it doesn’t really suit our body clocks, especially when presented with the gargantuan breakfast on offer at Hotel Emilia (basically to deal with COVID-19, they bring the full buffet breakfast experience direct to your table!) This meant that most days we didn’t want to eat anything else until about 5pm. This was way too early for Italian restaurants which don’t really get going until after 8pm. Waiting until then, however, meant we were still stuffed full the next day at breakfast! It was a terrible situation but somehow we coped!!
After a good week of relaxation, we headed north again for a bit of socialising on the shores of Lake Como with Drew, Mel, Freyja and the Specks. The weather wasn’t great, but it was nice to catch up and we spent our time eating, drinking cocktails and kafi luz, playing board games, with a small amount of watersports also taking place! From here we headed north again, back to Switzerland, filling the car with an inordinate amount of cheap groceries in Italy to keep us going, back in the land of expensive food.
One of the reasons for our extra week mooching on the Adriatic was to time our arrival back to Murg to coincide with Oktoberfest at Flumserberg. We’d had such good fun here two years ago that if it went ahead, we wanted to be there. Although the day was not quite as bright and sunny as two years ago, the event did not disappoint. Plenty of lubrication was had by all, including shots of the medicinal flavoured Appenzeller. As with two years ago, we feasted on Schweinhaxe and then danced the afternoon away before the obligatory bouncing on the Flumserberg pillow, where Beck got bounced off, and then a yomp down the mountain to make the last gondola by the skin of our teeth. If all this meant lying on a beach for a week, then count us in!