Holiday – Day 7 A Roman City

An early blog today as we are having a restful drink in the hotel lounge after a wet day. This is because the weather today has not been kind. It was our objective to travel on the new Mont Blanc Skyway that starts very close to the hotel. However when we woke up this morning it was raining and the mountains were covered with cloud. Indeed we have just looked at the webcams on the mountains and we would have just been looking out on fog.

So a quick re-plan, the weather looks good first thing tomorrow, so we are going to get up early and either travel up before breakfast or straight afterwards. Keep your fingers crossed for us tomorrow.

So the hotel came up with a contingency plan for today, a visit to Aosta the regional centre about 25 miles distant. This was first settled in 2900BC and because it is at a major crossroads of Alpine routes was of strategic importance for all civilisations from the Romans onwards. So there were lots of Roman remains. Also it was the birthplace of Saint Anselm who was an Archbishop of Canterbury in the 12^th Century. Interestingly it is bilingual with Italian and French being taught equally in the schools. There were several mentions of the need to keep speaking French.

It seemed to be a prosperous town with many interesting shops selling local produce. Very much the feel of Italy with one shop only selling fresh pasta. Inevitably there was an ice cream shop, so lunch comprised of a fantastic lemon ice sorbet and a strawberry ice cream. Yummy….

Of course everything closed down for a long lunch so we drove back to the hotel.

A mention for the hotel, not only is it well appointed but the staff our excellent,  professional and welcoming, nothing is too much trouble. The dinner last night was really good, although tonight I may cut down on the number of courses. Especially good were the local wines, we tried both white and red, apparently they are of high quality and only limited production. Not something to found in your local Booze Busters!

Tomorrow is also our drive to Provence and two weeks in a cottage. Seems to have come upon us very quickly.