friday in coccaglio with katia & guido

Friday morning, I was up early. I was very excited to travel to Coccaglio to spend the weekend with Katia and Guido. After stopping at a bar to have my morning espresso macchiato and a brioche, I bought a yogurt and picked up a newspaper and headed to La Rocca, a very peaceful place with a beautiful view of the city below to hang out for a while. After eating my yogurt and reading the newspaper, I went back to my hotel to check out.

When leaving the hotel with all of my luggage, I realized that I was blocked in by 2 cars. Outside the hotel, there are planters with trees in them that makes a U shape. Right next to the tiny place to exit was a car parked with only about 3 inches to spare. I had to have one of the people at the hotel help me get my bag rolling bag to fit between the planters and the car (she actually just pushed it through which was what I did not want to do as the car was pretty dirty and I did not want to get dirt all over my bag). Then I had to squeeze by almost knocking down all the branches along the way to get out with my 2nd bag on my back.

I took the funicular back down, and then caught the bus back to the train station. The train was pretty full and running about 10 minutes late. I printed out the schedule of times/stops so that I would know when we would arrive in Coccaglio. Because Coccaglio is a tiny town, the train only stops for about 30 seconds and so you need to be right at the door ready to depart. I got a little nervous as the train did not stop at the first planned stop and so I was not sure if it was going to stop at all the other stops. Also, this train did not have automatic doors that opened and so I would have to figure out how to open the door on my own. Luckily, there was a man at the door that helped me with open the door when the train stopped. Coccaglio is so small that you actually have to walk across the train tracks to get to the other side instead of going under the underpass to get to the other side.

When I got off the train, I did not see Katia at first as my train was on track 2 and she was waiting on the other side. For a moment, I had this fear that perhaps I did not get off at Coccaglio. After the train went by, I saw Katia on the other side of the track waiting for me! We were both so happy to see each and other, that we hugged right in the middle of the tracks!!

Katia took me back to her house and had lunch ready for me. She made a delicious pasta with tomatoes and a caprese salad. YUM!

(caprese salad)

After lunch, we went to the preschool where she works. She helps a student with special needs in a regular preschool setting. The children were all so cute! They have been learning about volcanoes and asked me questions about the volcano in Hawaii. I taught them the song "Head, Shoulders, Knees & Toes". They really enjoyed as we went faster and faster each time. They also taught me a song that is similar to the “Hokey Pokey”. It was interesting to see the similarities and differences between the preschools in Hawaii and the preschool here in Coccaglio.

When we left, we met Guido and then went to look at some apartments that Katia and Guido may rent when they get married. Then we went to see the historical part of Rovato, the town that Guido is from, and we also stopped at the mall where I bought a DVD and a CD.

We went back to Katia's house for a little while until dinner.

(this moka which was made out of cans was
next door to Katia's house at the community center)

For dinner, we went to this beautiful place on Lake Iseo to have pizza.

(view from the restaurant)

I still have not completely adjusted to the time difference and was pretty tired when we got back to Katia's house. I must have fallen asleep as soon as I hit the pillow.