Krik's Picks

When we started planning a trip to Europe, our goal from the beginning was Italy. But we decided to make Paris our first stop. We had several good reason. First, we like Paris. Second, it had been a long time since we'd been there. Third, we could take a nonstop flight from Minneapolis to Paris. So, we thought, this would be a nice way to begin the trip, by getting over our jet lag in the City of Light .  Of course, we thought a little bit about the possibility of terrorism. We hadn't made our reservation yet when the terrorist attack occurred in November 2015. That caused us to reconsider our plan. But we finally decided that we would stick with the plan. If the situation got more threatening, we could always cancel the Paris segment of our trip.  Well, the situation in Paris did not get more threatening. The only trouble with our three days in Paris was the weather. It was much chillier than usual for late April, and we had periods of cold rain. One day the rain turned t...

We arrived in Milan late in the afternoon, after a 7 hour train ride from Paris. The ride was smooth and uneventful. The train from Paris arrives at the Milano Porto Garibaldi station, not Milano Centrale. That shouldn't have been confusing. But when we arrived, I hadn't yet learned the lesson to always get directions for where we wanted to go. So while I thought the 25-minute walk seemed straightforward and foolproof, it wasn't. We pulled our luggage for about 45 minutes before I used Google Maps on my iPhone and got the correct directions.  So by the time we got checked in to our hotel, it was already early evening. We set out to explore our surroundings and find a place for dinner. We were almost ideally located, only a few blocks from the opera house La Scala and the fashion shops of central Milan.  View of Bellagio as the ferry crosses Lake Como Since the train ride from Paris took basically a whole day, we only had two full days to explore Milan. We had two go...

During our trip to Italy in May, we'd often be asked: Where else are you visiting while you're here? And when we'd tell them that Lago d'Orta was on our itinerary, we'd get this quizzical look. "How do you know about Orta?" they'd ask. Then they'd usually tell us that the town of Orta San Giulio was sort of a quiet little resort town usually only visited by other Italians. I couldn't tell if they were impressed that we were such savvy travelers, or worried that their little, secret gem might get overrun by Americans.  Lago d'Orta - Photo taken by a very nice French tourist We got the travel tip from a friend (an American friend) who was a former travel agent and had stayed there. When we were planning our trip, we mentioned to her that we wanted to spend some time in the Italian Lakes region, probably Lake Como. She told us about Orta and the wonderful hotel where she and her husband has stayed. We looked into it and decided to st...

Don't get me wrong. Our whole 26-day European trip was great. But the 3 days we spent in the southern part of the Piedmont was the best for me. It had everything - great wine, great food, wonderful quarters in an agriturismo, shopping, art, and culture. I would have been happy to stay longer.  Our reservation was in the town of Barolo. We drove there from the Lakes region in the northern Piedmont. The drive went smoothly, and we found our hotel pretty easily. (Click here for a review of the hotel, an agriturismo run by Angelo Germano and his family.) After we got checked in, we started exploring the town. It was very quaint. Also very small. We hadn't really intended to do any wine tasting, but we thought it would be fun to buy a bottle and drink it in our room. Our host suggested going to the Marchesi di Barola winery on the edge of town. It was a very enjoyable tour and tasting for €12. But we didn't like the wine well enough to buy any. Daily breakfast at Cafe Anti...

One of my goals for our trip to Italy in May was to deepen my knowledge of Italian wine. I had three strategies for achieving that goal: 1. Drink wine with meals during our trip; 2. Visit tasting rooms at different wineries; 3. Stay at an agriturismo where they make wine.  We stayed at two 'agriturismi' during our trip, one in Piedmont and one on the border between Lazio and Umbria. Both were very enjoyable experiences. There were many similarities between the two places; also many differences.  Our first agriturismo was Casa Svizzera in the town of Barolo in the Piedmont. It's owned by the Angelo Germano family and features their wines. The guest rooms are located above the winery tasting room in the heart of town. At the time of our stay, they had three rooms (though we were told by the owners that they are in the process of renovating additional rooms in the building for the future.) The rooms are clean, large, modern, and comfortably decorated. Our room had...