That time we never made it to Assisi

Some of the most beautiful moments of this trip happen when everything goes wrong.

Today I woke up at the crack of dawn (okay, like 6:45 am) to meet Abby and her other roommate Kate at the train station right by my apartment building to go to Assisi for the day. The train, according to the website, was supposed to depart Stazione Trastevere at 7:43 and arrive in Assisi around 10 am. That was a plan but, like planed things in Italy, things quickly disbanded when the train (and we still aren't sure how or why this happened) either never came/never was supposed to come. The three of us found ourselves standing in the station, perhaps on the verge of exhausted and stressed tears, staring blankly at the train bin board.

So we decided to get on the next train leaving the station to Bracciano. The only thing we knew about this place was that Tom Cruise and Kaitie Holmes had gotten married in Odescalchi Castle which sits at the top of the hill the town is built on (that was Abby and Kate).

The three of us show up in this tiny tiny tiny little medieval town which is still clearly all asleep save for the occasional cafe and bakery. We wandered through the cobblestone streets, overrun with grass and weeds until we ended up with a breathtaking view of Lake Bracciano. Being on top of a mountain the lake was covered with whitecaps and the wind was insane but it was so beautiful. As far as you could see just tiny little houses dotting the sides of the lake and the hills went on forever.

And then came perhaps the most comedic moment of my life, which, considering my perchance for being privy to some of the strangest and odd aspects of life, was pretty wonderful. You can tour the castle which we obvi wanted to do because Kate and Abby wanted to see where this wedding had taken place and, literally, it was the only thing to do in the whole town. So we go get our tickets and the women behind the counter says to us, in English, the next tour is at 10 am, but it's in Italian, there are no English tours today. And we're all like, yeah that's fine, it'll be us and a bunch of other people so we can just stay in the back and read the signs or whatever and we'll be fine.

The tour consisted of the three of us and our lovely Italian tour guide. The four of us in a castel built in the 1400s. She was amazing though and though we didn't get 100% of the information she was giving us, she went slow enough that my half Spanish half Italian thinking brain could get most of what she was saying. It was beautiful and historic and she let us walk around the rooms behind the roped off areas because, literally, we we're the only people in the entire complex.

Though, if I was getting married in the Italian Countryside I would pick a different town to do so in. Just saying.

Then we wandered around for a bit and went in a few churches before finding the best. lunch. ever. The women who owns the restaurant basically refused to let me order the Ravioli, telling me that all Americans order either the ravioli or the spagetti in red sauce and I should branch out so I ordered her favorite dish, the mezzaluna stuffed with mushrooms.

Amazing.

I mopped up all the sauce with extra bread. That delicious. I managed to get across in my broken Italian that it was the best dish I had ever eaten in all of Italy, not an exaggeration in the slightest. I'm contemplating taking my family to this town when they come to Rome solely for the purpose of eating at this restaurant. Trattoria del Castello. Everyone should come to Italy and eat there.

So tomorrow hopefully Assisi. Train tickets have been purchased so hopefully we'll make it there. If not I could glade go back to that trattoria. It was that good.