Road/Ski Trip: Days 4-6 (Au Revoir France, Boun Giorno Turino!)

     In Puy St. Vincent, we had raclette one night.  That's where you get a giant piece of cheese and put it underneath an electric heating element.  Then you scrape the melted cheese onto meat and boiled potatoes:

It's a fun way to enjoy melted cheese on meat and boiled potatoes.  But it's not a meal you should have every night.  Once a decade seems about right.

     Ed and Ford had fun skiing on Tuesday.  It was warm and sunny.  Averil and Asha opted out due to the poor snow conditions and general laziness -- possibly caused by eating too much melted cheese on meat and boiled potatoes.

      We decided we'd had enough of the ski station (good weather, bad snow, marginal accommodations) and we were anxious to get to Italy.  So we left the ski station early and headed toward the border on Wednesday.  We stopped at a mechanic in Briancon to check out a strange grinding noise under the car.  Once again, they were nice enough to accommodate us right away and free of charge.  Is it Averil's charm?

Diagnosis:  "Not sure.  Doesn't seem grave.  Enjoy your vacation.  Good driving!"

     From Briancon we went up, up, up, high into the mountains.  Then down through a series of tunnels.

Up Into Mountains

Down Through Tunnels

We kept waiting for some sort of official announcement that we had crossed into Italy.  None came.  But then the signs were suddenly in a different language.  We reasoned this was Italian, and inferred that we had crossed the border.  But we still had to 'taste' the theory so we stopped at a small town where we had take-out pizza in a sunny little park:

Now That's Italian!

Then we drove on to Turin.

     Wow.  Turin is a big city.  There are over 2 million people here in Turin. 

We have a good hotel a block from the Po River:

For no extra charge they gave us a nice dog bowl right in the room, complete with fresh running water:

     Italy is famous for its movies, so our first stop on Thursday morning was the National Museum of Cinema.  That was fun.  The exhibits are very elaborate.  There are exhibits on science and history . . . not only the history of movies, but on the history of optical devices in general.  Right now they have an exhibition about American cartoons:

Here's the movie poster from Star Wars in Italian:

     In the afternoon, we went to the Museo Egizio (Egypt Museum).  They say this museum has the largest collection of ancient Egyptian artifacts outside of Egypt.  It was all interesting, but the mummies and desicated human bodies were surely the best part:

     Then it was time for dinner!

     We had a great meal.  Everyone enjoyed their food, but we all agreed that Ed's choice was the best tasting:  donkey stew.  A regional specialty.

     Next stop:  Verona.