After leaving Rome, we had two days of driving to get to our next big location Alberobello. We stopped overnight at a small town called Venosa which turns out to be a fun little town. The weather had turned on us and we were getting mostly heavy overcast with frequent but short heavy rain storms during our drive.
The first thing I want to discuss is navigation. Two people who speak NO Italian were bound to have some difficult time with directions. So Ann (the knowledgable) had the foresight to arrange for a smart phone app to provide us directions. The last time we traveled within Italy, Ann had purchased the Verizon cell phone plan that let us use her phone in Europe and would provide us with enough data to allow us to use Google maps. This was wonderful. We picked up our rental car and drove through downtown Rome like we were natives. Granted it took two of us: Ann with her nose buried in the cell phone providing real time instructions of when to turn and me driving white knuckled and praying a constant novena. Last time we made it out of Rome without much drama, so this time we planned to repeat the same process.
A few months before our current trip, Ann discovered a potential problem with Google maps and switched to another app that is supposed to rely only on satellite and not need (much) data. I don't think this new app is of the same quality because it seemed to want to avoid all highways. We checked the settings (several times) and it wasn't set to avoid highways. We would be driving along and I would notice a highway off to the side going in the same direction while we were traversing something that was one step up from a goatpath. At one point I think I drove though various people's back yards. Whenever I'd point out a highway, Ann would tell me the app says it doesn't go where we are going. OK. This app had a number of other very annoying features were were unable to turn off. It would constantly tell you "Continue Straight" every few minutes, even if you were not at an intersection. And it binged every time I went above the speed limit. Grrrr. On the other hand, it did have a good handle on all the speed cameras.
We finally arrived in Venosa. A quaint town that would be more appealing if it wasn't raining. The next morning it was still raining so we set off to explore someplace in the town with a roof; like the castle in the center of town. This was a classic medieval castle with moat and everything. For a few euros we were let in to the museum. As it turns out, over the years Venosa had a vibrant Jewish community. The museum was mostly dedicated to the various Jewish artifacts found during the various archeology digs. Most of the descriptions were in Italian so it was somewhat limited.
After 20 minutes we were about to return to our car when lady who sold us our tickets beckon us to a yet to be explored upstairs. As it turns out there was an art gallery and an ongoing art lecture. Since the lecture was in Italian we headed to the gallery.
In the gallery was a group of a dozen or so paintings and a few people milling around. After a few minutes we were about to leave when an older lady approach us and trying to engage us in conversation. She spoke no english and we no Italian, the conversation went nowhere. After politely disengaging from this woman, another group lead by another older lady again tried to engage us. After a few minutes, Ann realized, "Google Translator"! Ann thens pulls out her cell phone and we establish a fun conversation taking turns typing in on Ann's cell phone and pressing "Translate".
As it turns out, this was a showing of a young artist's work. It was the artist's mother who stopped us from leaving (the 2nd time) and to get us to take a closer look at the various paintings. We went around to the various paintings with the artist answering our questions. After a few group pictures and an more informative goodbye, we tried to leave. Then the 1st older woman stopped us and started dragging us around to show off her work at a different part of the gallery. After another 20 minutes we finally got out of there and were able to head to out next destination.
Enclosed are pictures of the museum, samples of the Tora they found, the castle and yard, the young artist (and family) and her copy of a famous Caravaggio painting of Judith and Holofernes. (Or so Ann tells me, anyway. I just called it "My Husband Pissed Me Off One Too Many Times.") Tomorrow we are off to explore Alberobello.
Ciao
Bill
