Giorgio and I woke up before everyone else so he took me to a nearby pastry shop. He introduce me to the owner, Roberto, as his American parent. Roberto gave us some extra cookies, wink, wink. His entire family works with him behind the counter. I told Roberto that the brioche and cappuccino were the best I have had on my trip so far. Giorgio ordered cookies to take home, even though he said they weren’t any good. HA.
Afterwards Gabriele, Giorgio and I went to the Clock Tower to see an exhibit called “Time”. The Tower is attached to the Palazzo della Ragione where Charlie and I saw a marvelous show of the works of Marc Chagall several years ago. The hall, which is quite spacious (and currently empty) had been filled with temporary rooms to display his works according to medium: a room of water colors, a room of book illustrations, a room of paintings, many of which came from the private collection of a resident of Mantova. I walked away from that show with a profound appreciation of his work that I did not have before.
The Time exhibit in the Clock Tower had a fascinating time line of the history of time as well as a video (narrated by a friend of Giorgio’s) explaining how the clock, from 1473 was built, and how it came to be restored. The history of time itself is fascinating, I want to learn more about it.
We had a low key afternoon as the kids had commitments and then all 9 of us went to a great seafood restaurant for dinner. The owner is from the Amalfi Coast, she knows seafood and I am stuffed!
