Hungry birds

Invernale

It,s a bit brisk here at the moment. Too brisk for any outdoor activities except dog walking which remains compulsory.

Concime

Enough of driving around Italy having lunch at fancy restaurants. It's time to get back to the contadino life.

This is compost made from household waste which the local refuse company sell for €16.50 a ton which is great value and good recycling.

This is destined to improve the soil in the garden and the veg garden.

Monte Subasio

This is the view from the top of Monte Subasio - 1920 metres above sea level. Here we are looking north towards the Sibillini mountains in the Marche.

The summit is wild and above the tree line and is very good blast of nature at its most basic. As was the north east wind on Sunday.

Assisi lies of the lower slopes of Subasio and on the way down we stopped at the forest hermitage of San Francesco which was an oasis of tranquility. Well worth a stop outside of the summer months if you are around.

On the way back we stopped for lumnch at Il Molino in Spello. The food here was, as always, very good but all the waiting staff seemed to be suffering from what I call public interface fatigue.  A shame but nonetheless our lunch was excellent.

Company away day

Rachel and myself climbed in the company Panda and headed to Todi which is about an hours drive west of here.

The countryside soon changes from our olive dominated landscape to the vine covered hills of Montefalco and surrounds and then to the gentler more Tuscan type landscape around Todi itself.

Rachel checked out a exhibition while I had a meeting and then we had lunch at the Antica Hosteria della Valle which we can highly recommend should you be in the area.

First of the year

Yes, it was the first farmers market of the year in Trevi yesterday. Cold and not a good time to be selling olive oil but hey you gotta try. And I did sell some so yet another house in Italy has Casa Margherita olive oil on the table. The battle is just begun.

Anyway I immediately invested some of my profits in this string of onions. Wouldn't it be great if you buy onions like this at your supermarket. They look good in the kitchen as well

Dung circles

A grove roundabouts where the owner has speed dung in a very neat circle under the trees thus ring the grove a manicured look so it could be a municipal garden somewhere.

I could be catty and say the circle should spread to the edge of the canopy as this is where the roots are but I will desist.