Undiscovered Piedmont
 

We had two weeks this May in Italy and fell in love with Piedmont. Way off the tourist track and we thought as pretty as Tuscany... Did the Cinque Terre thing first - but moved on inland to the Piedmont wine country. If you are looking for an off the track city Turin is amazing. Covered walkways, palaces, etc. everything is being spiffed up for the Olympics in 2006. Incredible food and wine in this whole region. In fact Bra is where the slow food movement started and every place we ate in the area is out of the ordinary. Barolo is the King of Italian reds and after you try it you?ll see why. I?ve heard it is more busy in the fall during truffle season ? but in May we were the only Americans in most places we visited. Lot?s of wineries and wonderful undiscovered small towns.


We stayed in a great B&B and vineyard just out of the little town of Nizza Monferrato. Our first day there they had the town festival. Barrel rolling? Yes ? barrel rolling down the cobblestone streets. Each winery in competition with the others. Complete with a police escort and ambulance on standby. Amazing gelato, balloons, flag throwing and a mini carnival. What a town. The B&B Cascina Christiana was great. www.cascinachristiana.com
They have self catering apartments or just regular rooms. We liked it so much we stayed an extra two days. They have a great pool with a view of the vineyard and on a clear day you can see the mountains. Easy driving to Barolo, Asti, Alba and Turin. We even went up to the Val d'Aosta and Mont Blanc on a day trip from here.

I'm not sure why more people don't go to Piedmont - we loved it. It was our fifth trip to Italy and our favorite so far! Go now before everyone discovers it during the 2006 Winter Olympics?

Thank you for posting this. Piedmont is on my short list of places to visit--I'd love to get there before the Olympics as I'm sure it will be "discovered" after that. I take it you've been to Tuscany as well. What are the major differences? Why do you feel Piedmont is not as popular as Tuscany? Do you think it's primarily because Tuscany is boosted by the prescence of art and history-rich Florence? I'd love to hear more about Piedmont...

Hi Jocelyn,
You are right. I do think it is all the art. After all Florence is hard to top and Siena is amazing as well. Most people do the Venice Florence Rome loop and Piedmont is harder to get to unless you are on the way to France.

Turin has not put themselves out there as a tourist destination and so they really do get less mention. I had a hard time finding a good guide book for the region. I ended up with one from the UK. I was amazed to see that Turin was the main residence for the House of Savoy and there is quite a bit of history there. It is a beautiful town right on the river. Some parts of the movie The Italian Job were filmed there.

What I really liked was all the small wine towns. The vineyards go forever and we were the only americans at most of places we went. Tuscany is beautiful but much more touristed. And the food was amazing. Slow Food means everything has to be from the region and made fresh onsite. This region originated the slow food movement. One of the first things we look for on the door is the snail logo for slow food.

I would say if you are looking for off the track, great wine and better food you would love Piedmont.

How did you get this travel book from the U.K. ? We visited Tuscany in May. Was beautiful - yet the food was not what up to what ever I was dreaming of. Am interested in your post. Did you find your apt, some place that you enjoyed being in and relaxing for a week ? We had a marvelous apt in Tuscany, with the right ambience and $ - hoping to find more of same.

Barolo,
I've been following SlowFood.com for some time now and your report has made me jealous as hell! Now I'm going change my Calabria trip......well maybe!Thanks for some insight.
John

Piedmont sounds similar to the countryside around Verona, which I adored.

Barolo, I checked out the place you stayed; it sounds wonderful! The little town that's nearby--do they have a restaurant or two? Where's the nearest train station?

Hi guys,
Let me answer these in order...
Marcilee -The travel book from the UK was from amazon.com - I left it with our hosts at the b&b so I forget the exact name but it was something like Wine Country Northeast Italy - it covered all the wine regions in piedmont and liguria and aosta areas. With food recommendations. I'll try and find the exact name again and post it for you. The place we stayed was truely one of the best we've found so far. There was a castello in Tuscany Ripa d'Orcia that came close - but this was better. And the food in this region was amazing. We stayed in room but looked at the apartments and they are great as well. Not sure of the $$ on the apartments. Full kitchen and in some cases two floors. I put a review on www.slowtrav.com in the hotel section with more information and a picture of my hubby in the pool. If you'd like - email me and I can email you a few pics. [email protected]

Johnthedorf - I've not been to calabria yet - that is one region we have not hit. That and the marches are the only two we have missed! So I can't say whether to change your trip. Although if you like slow food this is the place for you! Hitting Turin before the olympics would be a good thing. I really this area will take off after people see it in 2006...

JocelynP - Yes, Nizza Monferrato has several good restaurants. One just down the road from Cascina Christiana - about 1.5 miles. I have to say though that you would really want a car in this region. There is a train station in Nizza - but to really see the countryside and the winerys etc. you really need a car. The trains are just not running often enough to these smaller areas. A car in this area is not as tough as some regions of italy. The drivers are decent and the autostrada is great. Lot's of tolls though. We had no trouble with parking. Let me know if you have more questions.

I'm just starting to plan my next trip to Italy, and after reading a lovely article about Turin in Gourmet(from a couple of months ago- the issue with the springroll on the cover), I was thrilled to find this thread.

Is Turin and the area so far off the tourist track that Americans with a good attitude but minimal Italian skills would have difficulties there?

Barolo- where did you stay in Turin, and do you recommend it? I'd love it if you post the guidebook title. Thanks!

We're thinking of late fall, early winter, to take advantage of game and truffle season, with lots of big red wines!

I'm off to the slowtrav site to start fantasizing.

Blueswimmer, Turin is not so far off that you need a ton of Italian. We have just enough to order and get a hotel and got along just fine.

We did not actually stay in Turin. The autostrada got you to Turin from that B&B I mentioned in about 40 minutes tops. So we went in for day trips.

The book was from amazon.com and is actually a wine book... but it has maps and lodging and restaurant recommendations as well. It was the only one that got into more depth on the area that I could find.

Here is the info from amazon...
Touring In Wine Country: Northwest Italy (Touring in Wine Country)
by Maureen Ashley,Master of Wine. It offers a comprehensive and inspirational guide to traveling in one of the world's top wine regions. Evocative descriptions of wine routes are accompanied by detailed maps showing the route and surrounding vineyards. Each title also includes the author's recommendations for hotels, restaurants, and producers.

If you go, and you like wine, be sure to hit Barolo and La Morra. There was a great Restauant in barolo just below the castello that is now the enoteche the name is something like La Cantinetta... It was a slow food location and it was superb.

Thanks Barolo! I just got the Let's Go book of Italy to check out more about the Piedmont!

I also would like to offer some thoughts about Turin.

The outskirts of the city are extremely industrial---with smokestacks spewing fumes into the air as far as the eye could see. This did not make for a "good" first impression of the area. (We arrived in Turin from the south.)

The center core of the city (north of the train station) and then continuing east to the river are lovely. Lots of designer shopping under the arcades, and most people very,expensively dressed. (There is definitely a lot of money in this town.)

The area south of the train station is scary enough to make you lock your car doors.

We gave "high marks" to every restaurant at which we dined.

The sites in the city center (palaces, churches and the "Shroud of Turin") were worth the trip. The monuments and touristy "castle" along the riverside were pleasant.

Two days is more than enough (in my estimation) to do justice to Turin.

Our biggest disappoint was the Egyptian Museum, which (according to the guidebooks)is supposedly a close second to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo---NOT A CHANCE. It was almost not worth the admission price.(Very dirty,musty,and with few "treasures" to offer. It is so far below the caliber of the galleries at the British Museum, the Louvre and the Vatican Museum that I began to wonder "who wrote these guidebooks and had they visited a different Egyptian Museum in Turin ??"

Our other disappointment was the Jolly Hotel in the city center. If we ever made a return trip to this city (which I would doubt----nothing pulling me to come back a second time) I would stay at one of the smaller,boutique hotels on a side street between the shopping arcades and the palace square.

We visited in 2002---maybe the Olympic monies for 2006 are making a difference in the more "rundown" sections of the city.

Don't know how much it has been spiffed up... There are a ton of Olympic flags and it was very clean everywhere. I know we did not feel at all worried about anywhere we went in Turin. We drove in and so did not see the train station area. We were in Piedmont for the food and wine and Turin had both and more. Try the chocolate as well.

Georgine and Barolo-

Thanks for excellent specific information! This board is so wonderful for going beyond the guidebooks.

Barolo---We drove into the city also, arriving from the south. The southern part of Turin is the more industrial and less pleasant section of town, apparently.

Blue Swimmer--- You are welcome!