A Man and His Cantina

So its a day off from cooking lets explore or perhaps as good sticky beak.

It was as if I was drawn to him, we were meant to meet. 

A man and his Cantina! In Australia it would be like a man and his shed, a man cave.

But an Italian a mans cantina is so much better, sure there is the tools hanging on the walls, but a bit more rusty and from the Dark Ages and not power tools these are hand tools for heavy construction and stone mason and he had tools to make your own wine, Rossa ( red ) & Bianca ( white ) and to top that all of it is actually in a cave down the side and under your 700 year old house. 

With its brick walls and domed brick ceiling and yet more little stairs to the even lower levels of the cave, but it was getting a bit damp down there with 50mm water on the floor, so some handyman work is under construction to do some drainage. This guy also has it own veggie patch several hundred more meters down this side of the hill, a flowing stream as the back drop with a sheer mountain on the other side shooting up a 70 degs so the whole veggie patch seamed fortified. What? have I died and gone to heaven! 

So back into the cantina the front section about as big as a L shaped double garage wrapped around the cave entrance to the back left with it old timber armed and padded lounge seats arranged around a stone fire place that you could easy fit a small pig on a spit, so food, wine and tools now thats what I call a mans shed.

So you may ask Pete just how did you find this place? Well it found me, true, I was drawn to it like a moth to a light I just seemed to be drawn more and more as I drove, so we were destine to meet. He lived at the far far end of the small calla, I was driving down this one way calla the wrong way! Woops, so as it turns out it doesn't always end up the wrong thing to do, but do it with conviction, a lot of sorry sorry,  I'm a dumb touristico in your little village that is so far off the tourist roads that the locals are wondering why you would want to be in their neck of the woods.

Cause it look amazing, interesting, old, ruined, mystical you know the usual!!!

Yes sure it did look at first to me as if it was a two way calla,  I thought I saw a faint hint of a white line on the centre of the entrance to the calla, but nope I must have been mistaken! 

Driving on the right hand side is getting a little easier and less stressed now as I have now clocked up 647 km and I'm nooooo expert and as long as I drive and think what I'm doing and I've got to tell you that has been hard to do. No watching the scenery, no perving on the locals, just driving and focusing on the road ( and not always on All the road signs ) 

I figure that if I'm sticking to the right, driving slow, I'm OK, but I do get myself in some tight spaces some times. These back calla were designed for foot traffic and some a bit bigger for a donkey and a small cart, well me and my large cart!

I have driven through some lovely little brick tunnels and today I got to find and experience one such great feat of 6th century construction right in front of me as I come around yet another little bend doing top speed 5km an hour. This calla had got so narrow and as they say I could see light at the end of the tunnel, well I could,  it may have only been only another 8m ahead, but it seamed like a long way. You may ask why not just reverse, and I can answer, you now as a little kid when you do the wrong thing you sometime just keep going until Woops I perhaps have just gone that little bit too far to turn back now! 

Mum help I,m stuck, what do I do, we'll you got yourself into the situation perhaps you just need to work something out for yourself. It is amazing how your childhood rushes back to mind. Sandy looked at me with a hmmmm and a bit of her usual grin and body language that showed either she loved me and she wanted to sit closer to me or she didn't want to be that close to the tunnel wall on her side. So with that, and a well,  go on, you can't stop now I move forward hoping that it will open up on the other side so we can do a 50 point turn and get out alive. O Pete you do love drama and you do create it and bring it on yourself.

I do remember seeing one little sign on the way it that could have meant, well it did mean, no through road, but now was not the time to let out that little bit of information to the one I loved in the passenger seat, but I'm sure she saw it!!! Thanks for the mirrors on either side of the car as they were to be my guides, my side markers. As long as the Romans made the tunnel to the mm at both ends we would be fine, we had at least 20 mm either side of the mirrors, loads of space, so as I move slowly forward with my window down I get to see exactly how each one of these hand made bricks are made, so later that afternoon when we emerged for the 8 m tunnel I'm pleased with the perfect to the mm measurement, thank you Mr Romans.

So out the other side and in front of me I can see that I may be able to turnaround if I can get a small opening off to the side, there are a very small cars parked in front on me and I won't be able to get past them. Now I'm screwed and it was just at that time my new best friend Doriano comes out to see who it is in such a big car in his little calla. He knows that I won't be able to turn around and with a smile and a wait he gets his keys and reverses his little car up, out of his driveway so I can turn around in it.  I did say he had a little car and it was housed in his small 1 car off calla parking area oh and did I mention it was on the side of a hill, the lower side!!!! Oh and it was in loose gravel! 

So with some precision driving, Sandy one side and Dorian the other we managed to true around. With a wave goodby from him, we were meant to just leave!  I just can't leave without a proper thank you, so I jump out of the car and head down his steep driveway to shake his hand and beg forgiveness for my sins. So with that, its a come on into my cantina and have a drink, we'll that was what I think he said as it was a mix of mostly Italian and hand gestures so before we know it we are all glass in hand and with his little english and our even littler italian we sit and chat the afternoon away.