Rating the Accommodations--Lauro Italy

Monte Grappa's hiding in among that fog somewhere.

http://www.beballauro.com/EN/index.html

B&B Al Lauro
July 1 - Jul2, 2010--2 nights

After leaving Cortina d'Ampezzo, a move which, in hindsight, was premature, if needed at all, we headed towards Treviso with our main goals of visiting the Pinarello factory and the Pinarello store and to make a visit to the great city of Venice (worthy of a sentence all by itself!).

Perhaps we should have done a better job of investiating the weather in northern Italy in June and July. Perhaps we would have adapted our schedule to have stayed in the mountains a few days longer.

It was dreadfully HOT, and HUMID to boot. I've been in Mississippi in July after a thunderstorm. This was not that bad. But being from California it was far more uncomfortable than we're used to with our "dry" heat. Like I said, if we'd known we would have stayed at altitude.

Driving around Treviso was an interesting mess. The poor Garmin was next to useless. We looked all over for the Tourism office with, and ultimately without, the GPS. We weren't terribly impressed with any of the lodging options we were seeing there. So we opted to move out towards Castelfranco Veneto, which I'd seen in earlier research on the area around Monte Grappa.

Oh, but first, we did make it to the Pinarello factory in Treviso. We arrived on a Thursday, and it was closed for inventory through the following Tuesday. So much for checking for possible conflicts--I'd researched their operating hours, local festivals, and tide charts and I thought we had it clear. Didn't think of inventory. The building itself was nice, and we could see stuff through the windows and they had a nice display of bikes in the front of the building. We made an appointment to come back to the factory the following Tuesday but, in the end, we blew it off and didn't return to Treviso after leaving and looking for lodging north of town.

We went to see the Pinarello store, too, and it was a little bit of a letdown. It wasn't much bigger than, say, a run-of-the-mill strip mall location. Maybe 30 feet wide, 100 feet deep. They had a few bikes lined up, and clothes all over the place. But it wasn't Charlie and the Chocolate Factory kind of stuff. We weren't awestruck and overwhelmed. It was just a bike shop, I guess. The one thing I did learn about was Passo Boldo


On the wall of one of the dressing rooms was placed a picture of Fausto Coppi racing up Passo San Boldo in one of the Giri di Italia. It's an awesome looking piece of engineering. Look carefully--the hairpins are tunneled into the mountain at each end. I don't know how difficult a climb it was, but it looked awesome. I wasn't able to do any research on its location in time to be able to visit it. It was not very far from Treviso, though.

So. . . lodging. After leaving Treviso we arrived in Castelfranco, located the Tourism office only to discover it had closed at noon that day. Not knowing what else to do, we continued looking at different cities and towns nearby and ended up in Asolo--a name I'd recognized from the 2010 Giro. The race passed through Asolo on their way up Monte Grappa on Stage 14 before finishing in Asolo.

We found a Tourism office there in Asolo, and a reference to some guy that owned a clothing store nearby. He showed us the room and we were completely frightened of the man and his room. He was kind of creepy. The rooms were dark and hot. We didn't see any immediate relief from the heat in the form of AC and, this being Thursday night, he told us the cleaning lady wouldn't be back until the following Monday. Nuh-uh. We told him we had to check out one other place and we'd get back to him and then we got out of there, and out of Asolo, as quickly as we could.

Thereafter, we weren't sure what we were going to do. It was beginning to look like we might really end up spending the night in the car. I'd remembered seeing the name of a little town not far from Asolo, it had shown up in the hotel/B&B listing we'd picked up at the Asolo Tourism office--B&B Al Lauro. We thought maybe "Al Lauro" was a guy's name, but it was in reference to a little hamlet called Lauro and "B&B Al Lauro" translated into Lauro B&B.

As we approached Lauro, we saw several farm houses, none of which looked the least bit inviting as a B&B. We could see a house down the road that looked newer and, as we approached it, the address numbers were coinciding properly. Then, there it was--a SIGn--B&B Al Lauro. Just as we were driving up, the owner was stepping out the front door. If we'd been 5 minutes later he would have been gone and our search would have had to continue. A GREAT family, though. It turned out to be a terrific find.

The only bad thing was they could only keep us Thursday and Friday nights, they were booked for Saturday. Which led to another search for a place to stay on Saturday afternoon.

In any event, you know, I don't even think we learned the owners' names. There are a couple of names mentioned in the website, but I'm not sure which was appropriate. Whatever their names were, they were very nice, very nice, pleasant people. They built the B&B after the owner's mother died. The family lived in the house next door (about 200 yards down the road). When the mother died, the father farmed a few more years, then had to give it up. They kept the property, built the B&B, and the father lives in half the building, the other half has 4 guest rooms, and a large ground floor with a kitchen and eating area. It really was quite nice.

The prices were very reasonable based on what we'd seen so far. 50 euros/day for the two of us, breakfast included. There was no half board option. The rooms were very comfortable, very clean, new, and AIR CONDITIONED.

The breakfast was what we'd become accustomed to. . . basic stuff. Linda raved about the coffee. She said it was the best we'd had all trip.

The location was fine--close to the foot of Monte Grappa, which we rode on Saturday. We took the train from Castelfranco to Venice on Friday. And it was hot all the while. Even the owners were complaining about the heat and humdidity.

I would highly recommend the B&B al Lauro if you have reason to be in that vicinity. There was a nice little family-run restaurant just up the road--Al Lauro Ristorante Pizzeria. We ate there at least three times over the few days we were there.

I'd just suggest that you go before May, or after August.

Rating the Accommodations - Cortina d'Ampezzo

Hotel Aquila, June 28-June 30, 2010, 3 nights

http://www.aquilacortina.com/index_ing.php

Piazza Pittori Fratelli Ghedina, 1
Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy

After leaving Arabba, and riding Fedaia, we planned to head to Cortina d'Ampezzo, about a half hour drive from Caprile. We had not booked a room prior to our arrival in Cortina. We planned to stop by the tourist office for some guidance. I felt goofy walking around in my cycling gear--but it turned out to be a pretty easy experience. When we arrived in Cortina, the office was still closed for their afternoon break. At 3:30 p.m., they reopened to a group of about 7-8 people looking for various tips on what to do, where to stay, etc. After a quick consultation, we headed over to Hotel Aquila to inquire about a room. They had plenty of space, we booked right away. We needed a shower!

Location: Hotel Aquila is at one end of a pedestrian only shopping zone. It was close to the road, had free parking (though not much of it), and was close to everything we needed. The traffic noise was not noticeable from the road about 100 yards away. There was a pasticceria close by! In the evenings, the locals tended to stay out late so the most noise was from the people down in the plaza talking into the later evening. No complaints about the location.

Rate: 70 euros/person/night half board. This was about what we'd been seeing most everywhere else, or within 10 euros of what we'd been seeing. Other Cortina locations were slightly more expensive and I don't know that they offered anything better.



Rooms: Hotel Aquila's rooms were some of the largest we experienced during our trip. They were not completely modern, but were certainly very comfortable and clean. Our room was on the 3rd floor, on the corner with a broad balcony on two sides of the building. The view out the bedroom's french doors were straight out to the mountains. While not as beautiful as Lake Como, the view was, nonetheless, superb.

36) 867315


: info






Food: It was okay. Hotel Aquila followed the same process as the other hotels we visited. We'd have three choices for a first course, three for an appetizer, and three for a main course. Desserts were weakest here. Breakfasts were the same basic stuff we'd seen elsewhere, just wasn't as eagerly anticipated as in other places. Of course this may have had as much to do with the growing familiarity with Euro breakfasts as with the actual quality. We didn't get sick, so it must have been fine.

Staff: The owner kept a pretty visible profile. He, his wife and a kid. Kind of an odd dude, shaved head. Nice enough, I guess. And patient with us as we worked through dinner menus. They had visitors over regularly, with their kids, and they would eat in the same dining room as we did. No problem with that, other than the kids would get to running around with cardboard or plastic swords carrying on. The guy must have changed clothes 5 times a day. Every time we'd see him he'd be wearing something different. The staff he'd hired were very nice--young folks mostly. Very friendly and seemingly eager to assist. One older gentleman ran the bar. At first I thought he was an elitist--kind of seemed to stick his nose up at everything we did. I think I just misunderstood him. Once engaged in conversation he came across as a good guy.

Expensive on the internet usage, and phone calls. I don't know how they figured how much time we'd used the computer. All the other places we'd been sold blocks of time and you knew exactly how much time you had (even as you were wasting most of it waiting for the computer to function).

Recommend? Eh--3 out 5 stars. The building was in good shape. There were pictures of it around the place in its earlier appearances. It's been kept up nicely. I have no idea how profitable it is to run a hotel like this in Italy. The family seemed okay--they usually live on premises, as this family did. I never learned this fellows name, and the conversation was never familiar enough for me to ask him. There were many, many other locations to choose from. Once recommended that we did not check into was Hotel Olimpia. They quoted a higher price, with no half board option. It had some construction going on in front of it during our stay, which certainly will cease at some point and then will make Olimpia a more likely candidate next time.

http://www.hotelolimpiacortina.com/lang1/index.html

Hemingway on Bicycling

It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle. ~Ernest Hemingway

Rating the Accommodations - Arabba, Italy

Hotel Malita, Arabba, Italy, June 25-27 2010 3 nights.

http://www.hotelmalita.com/it/malita_ambiente.php

http://www.hotelmalita.com/en/index.php

Via Mesdi, 54

32020, Arabba, Italy

After leaving Bormio, we headed for the Pyrenees. We had reserved spots only through to our stay in Bormio, deciding to wing-it on the remainder of the trip on assurances that we wouldn't have any trouble finding a place to stay during this time of year. This was generally true, but it was still sometimes a lengthier than necessary search depending on what we found when we got to our first locale.

After leaving Bormio, our first thought was to travel to Alleghe in the Dolomites for a feew nights. Upon arriving there, we were not captivated by the two, although its location on a small lake was nice. There was one main drag through town and it was pretty busy. We checked out 2 locations--one we didn't care for much (views front and rear weren't very good) and we tried another overlooking the lake, but they could accommodate us for just one night.

Location: So we dragged out the maps, bought some margherita pizza, some strudel, and coke, and decided where to go next. We settled on Arabba due its location smack dab on the Sella Ronda between the Pordoi and Campolongo passes. There's another town that could have served well, Corvara, but we'd heard that it was a boring town, so we didn't check it out. It would have meant another 20 minutes' drive and it was late by this time.

We checked in with the tourism office, which proved to be invaluable, told the woman attending the desk what we were looking for and she came up with several alternatives. Out of nervousness we would get aced out of a room if we didn't act quickly, we went to Hotel Malita first since it was a little closer. Another, Hotel Olympia, we could see from the road below and it looked decent, and well-visited. May be worth a try if you decide to stay in Arabba. My suggestion, though, if you want to stay ON the Sella Ronda is to check out Corvara. Arabba was nicely situated on the Sella Ronda but the town was very small with very little to do bu walk around in short circles.

Corvara was much larger and afforded a little more in the way of distractions, if you want to call them that, and the views were better.

Corvara's located between the Campolongo and Gardena passes. There are numerous other small towns here and there that could also be considered, but in terms of proximity to the Sella Ronda, these two are it.

Rate: 50 euros/person/night, mezza pensione. Hotel Olympia, I think I remember correctly, was just 45 euros/person/night. Frankly, I was a little nervous about such a low rate, fearing quality concerns, cleanliness, etc. The fears were unfounded.

Rooms: The rooms were a nice size, not particularly modern, but they were certainly adequate. No complaints. Along the back side of the hotel, where our room was, we were facing a parking lot and there was a stream running through a man-made course that made for "good splash", as Linda likes to say, but the views were not engaging. Our room happened to be right above the kitchen and we could smell both the good and the bad of its activities. A little annoying, but nothing we couldn't live with.

Hotel Malita Bathroom--clean, adequate--I didn't try the bidet.

Food: Hotel Malita was the first one to offer granola in addition to muesli for breakfast. Their breakfast was about like all the others we encountered. Nothing extravagant, but everything that was needed. Dinners were good, which was one of the things I worried about with the price. The selections each night were enough to where we were always able to find something we liked. Malita followed the same course as Alu, three choices for a first plate, three for the main course, then dessert (plus a salad to start). Their gelato wasn't as good as Alu's.

Staff: our contacts with most of these places was the restaurant staff. Hotel Malita had a waiter and waitress that we saw each night and morning. The waiter spoke English pretty well, and the waitress could get by between my English and Spanish and her Italian. We liked them very much, no complaints here. The waiter reminded Linda of Peter Sellers--and she had a point.

Recommend: I'd recommend Corvara over Arabba, but if Arabba's where you want to be, there are worse places than Hotel Malita. And there are quite a few hotels in Arabba--a visit to the tourist office would be recommended. Malita's internet service was high at 6 euros/hour. We found another internet spot in a hotel bar across the street that was considerably cheaper, but suffered from serious computer performance issues.