Italy Returns - Agriturismos, Ocean's Twelve, Casino Royale & The Hunt For Red Super Tuscan

          Welcome to the first official return trip blog in my series of blogs.  Yes we finally chose to go back to a place we once explored in our past, not surprising, we chose for it to be Italy (amusing since I have a business trip in Rome this November).  Thanks to the many holidays offered in the U.A.E we placed our time off on tail end of the second Eid holiday to maximize our time.

          This time we decided to lay low and stay outside the big cities on the countryside.  We avoided
the mass crowds from the city for the most part, but while there were not many people, there was no short supply of good wine.  After landing in Rome we rented a car from the airport and made our way to our first destination which about two and a half hours north just below Florence.  Sarah researched a series of agriturismo's (basically just a fancy Italian way of saying we lived among nature along a vineyard) and found one by the name of Fattoria Cinciano.  It was a smooth drive along a pay by the kilometer highway which changed to narrow one way roads leading up to the agriturismo where you would get to play chicken with the cars coming the other direction.  

View from our Villa window @ Cinciano

          Fattoria Cinciano was a beautiful property site on the top of a long stretch of rolling hills and valleys.  The historical records of the property dates back to 1126 (most likely of Roman origin) when they were donated to a Bishop by a widow in the region.  The age and retained beauty shows through out the establishment and is surrounded by vineyards as it drops into the valley.  We rented out a villa that was separated by three floors, the first floor had the kitchen and bathroom, the second had a small living room and the third was the main bedroom.  

Cinciano

          After we settled in we set out on what would be the most depressing part of the trip.  If you recall from our first Italy blog I came a across a life changing wine during our journey which was classified as a Super Tuscan.  This was located in the town of Greve near Florence.  Well we drove out there straight to the winery to get a not so nice welcome and were also informed they were sold out of my prized wine.  I will admit I was depressed for a while, however this let down began the new hunt for a good red full bodied wine and also led me to learn what the term Super Tuscan actually means and how some Italian wine makers feel about it.  

Cinciano at night

          We decided to have lunch in Greve and try out some wines in local wine stores before driving back to our place.  We found a nice under ground Enoteca (Italian for "wine repository") where they had a sophisticated wine sampling system.  For the Grand Rapids readers, its very much like the wine system at the Reserve wine bar downtown where they use nitrogen in the bottles to preserve the wine for much longer.  This allows for stores to permit tasting of much higher end wines knowing that after de-corking, instead of the standard week or so, the wine will last a month or two.  This minimizes the risk of taking a loss on a good wine by selling by the glass knowing that in a month it will probably get bought up.  It was really great that this system was spreading around Italy because I was able to try a few wines that sold for hundreds of dollars for just a few euros.  I think the challenge with buying an expensive premium wine is that the taste you get when buying is not necessarily what you are paying for, you're paying for what it will taste like after a number of years of aging.  After tasting a number of great wines from the high tech dispensing machines in the humble town of Greve, we drove back to Cinciano villa in the town of Poggibonsi to enjoy a quiet dinner at the restaurant in our agriturismo.

Bolgheri

Breakfast at Cinciano

           We woke up to a beautiful sunrise looking over the valleys of vinyards with the walled hill town of San Gimignano in the distance.  We had a standard European breakfast (or at least what I have run across in our bed & breakfast travels) in the morning at our place which included cured meats, assorted cheeses and fresh bread.  After breakfast we decided to explore a town near the west coast of Italy named Bolgheri.  The entrance to the town is actually through a narrow castle drive up to an area of shops and restaurants.  The history of the town was interesting to look into as it was destroyed and restored several times.  Bolgheri was put on the map back in 1974 when a tasting competition was held and a six year old local "Super Tuscan" known by the name of Sassicaia won out over an assortment of Bordeaux wines.  A 2012 bottle of this wine will run you about $170 and rises in value by about $30-40 each year.  We found a restaurant that was attached to a wine shop so we were able to do a nice series of wine tasting (this place also had a nice high tech sampling system), including the famous Sassicaia among others.  After tasting many of the wines over lunch, we ended up buying a box full of wines before heading out to the beach.  Since we were so close to the water, Sarah wanted to catch a glimpse of the Mediterranean before driving back to our place.

Winey / Vineyard (San Gimignano
in the distance)

             That night when we got back we decided to venture out and try a different restaurant than the one at our villa so we drove into Poggibonsi to a pizza place I found online.  I found Bocca d'Ersa which was clearly a place where mostly locals hung out, it was a great find and the pizza was amazing, the table wine served in a half liter bottle was also quite good.

San Gimignano at night

              On our third day we explore some neighboring towns that were a little closer than the drive to Bolgheri.  Our final destination was the hill town of San Gimignano (which we could see in the distance from the window in the villa we were staying in), but we decided to drop by a few wineries on the way.  It was this day when I learned a little more about the term "Super Tuscan" from some local wineries.  The term was born when many of the local Tuscan wine makers were suffering to adhere to the Italian DOC/G (must contain 70% Sangiovese grape and 10% of local wine grapes) Chianti wine status and thus implying a certain lack of quality (and also due to wines attempting the status that fell short) to the wines.  So a couple of wineries went rogue and started

Torre Grossa

making blends that intentionally fell short of the requirements.  It was not long before many of these "Super Tuscan" wines began to beat out the prices of some of the most well known DOC official Chianti wines.  This attempt was to create a wine brand people recognized on its own merit, this trend spread throughout the region forcing the regulations to be changed allowing more of these these wines to qualify for DOC status.  We tried some of the amazing grapes in the region on the way to San Gimignano that most likely produced some of our favorite Super Tuscans.  I mentioned this in the Cyprus blog, but I am so amazed at how many grape strains actually exist all over the world.

Top of Torre Grossa

San Gimignano at night

              After some great wine tasting (and education), we drove up
the hill to San Gimignano to start off exploring the stone castle city on the hill.  San Gimignano was absolutely beautiful on the inside, the lack of modern signs and store advertisements on the outside is one detail that truly impressed me.  As we walked through the narrow pathway we saw leather shops, hotels, restaurants and Gelato (Italian for ice cream) , but even though we had all these modern shops to our right and left, I still had the feeling of walking through an old medieval town as if I were back in that time.  Sarah and I walked in and out of a few shops all the way up to one of the towers (which of course we climbed, we always climb anything that needs climbing it seems) called Torre Grossa which gave us a great view of the city and surrounding landscape.  After descending the tower we walked back towards the entrance to have some pizza at a table on the cobble stone road before heading back to our villa for a nap before dinner at
another agriturismo named Casa Bandini.
           

Torre Grossa

 As per usual we did not have a solid plan for travel destinations when we chose to come back to Italy.  Like so many other vacations we just drift as we see fit.  On day four it was decided we would take a three hour road trip up to see Lake Como.  This lake was unknown to me until I saw the movie Oceans 12 (all scenes filed at George Clooney's Villa on Lake Como) and of course at that point

Lake Como after the weather calmed

became a must see movie film site destination for me.  Lake Como's stock also went up with it appeared in one of my most favorite movies, Casino Royale, which in my opinion spawned the beginning of the best James Bond series yet.  The drive up was a bit rough with weather and the further north we drove the colder it became.  It was a drastic change from Siena where the temperature was 70 to 80 degrees, by the time we reached Lake Como (through about 15 tunnels carved through mountains) it was around 50 or 60 out with heavy rain and wind.  Putting the weather aside, the scenery of the Lake Como was amazing.  As you come out of the last tunnel to reach the

The good weather day at Lake Como

Bellagio region where we stayed, you enter into this beautiful body of water cut into the surrounding snow cap mountains.  I have layed eyes on many amazing landscapes before in our travels, but this was one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen.  It combined Sarah and I's most favorite natural combinations, she likes to be in the mountains while I like being near bodies of water.

Bellagio - (Apertivo to my left)

Dock by Hotel Metropole

             We braved the weather after checking into the Hotel Metropole (I had to brag to my brothers that I was staying in legit Bellagio versus Las Vegas of course) and walked around the town to browse some stores and wine shops.  Our room was quite a steal considering we had the only terrace overlooking the lake and the town, although we did not enjoy it as much as we could considering the weather.  We had a small bite to eat on the port in a cute little restaurant before walking around.  It was also here where I found an amazing pair of Italian leather shoes that I instantly fell in love with (that does not happen often) and had to have.  After the shoe frenzy was over we found this amazing wine bar (called Aperitivo et al) set inside a wine cellar design where we spent the next few hours going on virtual wine tours.  The wine bar was set on a

Restaurant on the port

beautiful long stretch of stone stairs coming up from our hotel by the water.  Our host was superb in learning our taste and was spot on with our palate almost the entire night.  We had so much fun trying wines and appetizers that we made a habit out of visiting the place while we stayed there.  We made reservations with the restaurant next to Aperitivo et al early on in the day as we heard it was difficult to get a reservation.  We learned why it was so difficult in the evening as the food and wine were amazing.

Lenno

               Our second night we booked a hotel room at the Hotel du Lac a few buildings down from the Hotel Metropole.  Our second day on Lake Como was absolutely beautiful compared to the weather of the first day.  Our extremely helpful host at du Lac gave us some great ideas about ferry tours around the lake.  There are boats all over the lake that make regular stops to the surrounding small villages.  Like Bellagio, each town along the lake has just a small area of coverage with some nice restaurants, shops and hotels, but each one has its own unique charm and attraction.
 Following my pursuit of visiting all my favorite movie locations, we decided to take a ferry to the town of Lenno where travelers have the opportunity to visit the Villa del Balbianello where they filmed many parts of Casino Royale.  The tour if the villa was beautiful and it was very cool to stand

Casino Royale Scene

on all the locations where they filmed the Casino Royale scenes (as always I have provided

Balbianello

references for your enjoyment).  After touring the villa we walked back towards the boat dock to get some Gelato and lunch.  We had lunch at a nice restaurant / bar along the lake before getting back to our ferry ride.  We walked around Bellagio for the afternoon before dropping by Aperitivo et al again to try some more wines.  For dinner we shared a steak in the restaurant connected to our hotel before heading to bed.
              For our final day we started making our way south towards Rome for our flight.  We made a pit stop in Milan to do some daytime shopping.  It was crazy how much we were affected by large crowds in the big city after spending the entire week in the outskirts and quiet towns

Bellagio at night (Hote du Lac)

of Italy.  I was slightly amused at the fact that Milan had this very large canopy covered high end shopping center containing stores like Gucci & Prada, their original homes before branching out to the world.  The amusing fact was that it was called The Galleria, it wasn't until this trip that we realized that the shopping mall below my place of work in Abu Dhabi was an exact indoor replica of Milan's Galleria, same stores and everything.  We both found some interesting clothing items outside our normal chain of store brands which made the trip worth it.  After a few hours of shopping we took the train back to our parking garage and started the trip back to Rome to catch our flight the next morning.

Duomo di Milano

              From Milan we had about a three hour drive back to Rome.  I forgot to mention I left my hat at our original agriturismo which we had to make a detour to reclaim.  The main highways are interesting in Italy because you have to get a ticket to drive on them and when you exit, you pay a fee for distance traveled, we paid roughly 25 euro for a three hour drive.  After collecting my hat we made the final drive to Rome to stay at the Hilton before our flight.
              Our second visit to Italy was wonderful.  Surprisingly we had virtually no repeats from our first trip and I would say our small town visits and our trip to Lake Como is what really made the trip worth it.  Lake Como was definitely the highlight of the trip, we both fell in love with the scenery and the cozy small town charm, we would love to visit again soon.  I was also impressed at how much I learned about wine on the trip, I will admit I thought I had a good handle on my wine education, but I gathered a lot of insight from this visit about "Super Tuscans" in particular.  Italy is a place I think we will continue to visit (I actually have a business trip in Rome next month) as it is one of those countries that take a number of visits to cover all the desired subject areas.  Anyone could easily make a trip out of staying in agriturismo's or in Lake Como.  
                    

Abu Dhabi - The Experience Never Ends

          It has been a very long time since my last entry about Abu Dhabi.  Life between now and my last entry has been a whirlwind of changes, losses and new developments.  We went home late December to attend my brother Geoff''s wedding which was a lot of fun.  We were back from the wedding in Abu Dhabi for less than a day early January when we got the news that my dad had passed away unexpectedly.  So we immediately turned back to Michigan to make the arrangements and say goodbye.  I have to say I have been through a lot in my life, but this has to be one of the hardest situations I have ever had to experience.  But I will say it has only strengthened my desire to to live life to the fullest, cherish every day and never stop taking risks.

          Many things have happened in Abu Dhabi since my last entry, one major milestone is that my place of employment: Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi (CCAD) is has finally opened its doors and started seeing patients.  In addition to moving to a new country, meeting people from all over the world, I have to add that working for and helping to open CCAD has been one of the most rewarding experiences in my life.  The advancements we have been able to make in such a short period of time with such a small team has been impressive to say the least.  I have been able to accomplish more at CCAD with business intelligence and analytics than I have anywhere else.  I also included two pictures of the hospital, one where I had to go to work in a sandstorm and one on a normal day.  If you have watched the mission impossible filmed in Dubai, the sandstorm in that movie was not an exaggeration, I'm sure this picture will prove that.  

           Over the last year Sarah and I have really taken advantage of all Abu Dhabi has to offer.  One of the cool things we were able to check out was a wake boarding competition that they had at the Al Forsan International Sports Resort.  The competition was set in an automated wake boarding pool pulling all the contestants on a cable around the park.  You can actually rent time on this park during regular hours (which I have yet to do).  After the competition there was a small party afterwards which we hung around for.           

 I have been enjoying the vast selection of Cuban cigars in the UAE as well on occasion.  There are many great Cigar lounges in Abu Dhabi (St Regis, The Rosewood and Emirtates Palace).  I also went to a cigar rolling presentation where someone from Cuba was flown in to hand make the cigar you would try.  Me and my friend Leo from work went together to watch and enjoy a cigar one night.  I learned that the tobacco inside a cigar is rolled up and that the leaves used on the inside are the ones left in full sun on the tobacco plant where the outside cover of the cigar is left more in the shade.  My friend Leo (U.S. citizen, originally from Guatemala) spoke in Spanish to the nice woman rolling our cigars as she did not speak any English.  After knowing I can buy Cuban cigars in the UAE, I didn't think it could get any better.  But apparently it can and that means having a professional cigar roller from Cuba make your cigar right in front of you.  There's nothing like adding an educational experience to a classy joint with a nice Cuban cigar.

           Before I sound too unhealthy, I have also taken up golf and the sport of squash while I've been here.  The Westin resort in Abu Dhabi has a PGA course and a halogen night course you can golf.  I have a group of friends I head out with usually in the middle of the week to run the course.  For me it is quite difficult as I am still quite a novice at golf, I usually bring about five extra range balls off the assumption that I will probably lose them all.  I am much more serious about squash however and have improved vastly over the last year.  I have become so serious that I actually have a coach I train with once a week apart from my two game nights in my league.  If you have never tried it before, it looks like racket ball, but it is far from it.  Squash is one of the most cardio intense sports there is, the professionals tell me "you don't play squash to get fit, you get fit to play squash".  Also in the world of sports, Sarah's company (Mubadala) sponsored a health walk where she got to meet Kareem Abdul Jabar, and just recently when I was out with my friends we ran into another retired NBA player Jawann Oldham who played for many teams including the Bulls and the Lakers (he played for a total of 8 teams).  He is in town as a coach for the Olympic team (he is also a 1980 Olympic gold medalist) and is also the director of the basketball academy of Dubai.       

         Another highlight I would have to say for me was running my first 10K, I never opted to do it in the states because I am stingy and never wanted to pay money to run.  So I got my chance when my hospital offered to pay for the first two hundred employees who signed up.  I find that practicing for a 10K is actually harder than running the official race.  The actual 10K is way easier: you have people cheering for you, handing you water at various intervals (that you can pour all over yourself and drink) and you have all these runners around you to compete with and set pace.  I have not been in a running competition since my high school track days and I forgot how great that runners high feels after a good long run. 

         Sarah's work gave us free tickets to the Formula one races as well as an after party show with Pharrell Williams performing.  The race was a lot of fun, we had actually been on the track many times to ride bikes during the week nights when they allow you to, so it was actually cool to see them race on the track.  You can also pay a decent sum of money to race your own car on the track (However, many people do not realize you completely destroy your tires on the track and have to replace them after).  Pharrell Williams was ok, he was complaining about a sore throat or his stake smoke bothering him, but we got to see "Happy" live, so there you go.  

Formula One Track

           Early this year Sarah and I booked a stay at the Atlantis resort in Dubai which in on the Palm Island.  We scheduled time there to do the dolphin activity mainly but also found that the water park was a lot of fun.  The dolphins were great to swim with and let pull you around, it was a great experience for anyone who has never done it before.  There was a slide in the water park (if you can call it that) where you have to step into a capsule standing straight up, the door closes on you, and a trap door drops from beneath and you free fall for a second or two before doing a cork screw upside down and out.  It is truly terrifying the first time you do it, but I had to do it a few more times after my first.  According to Sarah I screamed all the way down the tube on my first run.  I have to say it was hilarious when I finally convinced Sarah to go and seeing her reaction.  

            My brother also came earlier this year on the tail end of his honeymoon.  I have to say it was quite priceless to see both of their reactions come out of the airport, I am not sure I had the exact look on my face when I first arrived in the UAE, they seemed a bit shell shocked to be in the middle east.  But after a day or so and us taking them around they realized this place was not only safe, but actually a lot of fun.  Who would have imagined we would all meet in Abu Dhabi together one day.  We took him and his wife Jillian around Abu Dhabi, to the local zoo, stayed at Qasr Al Sarab (also stopped at a car museum on the way) resort again and then went back to the Atlantis in Dubai to Skydive over the Palm and enjoy the water park.  I was happy I also got a chance to show my brother the new hospital too and have him meet some of my local friends and friends from other parts the world.
                I was rather surprised how much I wasn't terrified to go skydiving in Dubai.  Me, my

brother and Sarah all planned to drop out of the plane and when the time came I was ready.  I was the first to drop out with my guide.  Initially it is cold and very loud as you free fall through the air, the view was breathtaking.  Slowly the air gets warmer and just at that point the shoot is pulled and it becomes completely silent.  You just coast for a while before lifting your legs up and landing on your butt in the grass.  Thankfully we hired photographers for the event, Geoff had a fear there was no air up at the high altitude where we were skydiving so he was making a hover vacuum face in a bunch of his photos...priceless.  Although I think I would have rather had his pictures as clearly I didn't realize that I was doing double bull horns in half of my pictures (what a tool).  Sarah clearly is the most photogenic when (and had the best photographer) it comes to skydiving as she had the best pictures (as if I had any doubt),  Geoff and Jillian really enjoyed the water park as I assumed they would, I forgot to mention before that the Atlantis has a sort of lazy river on steroids.  It takes you up and down on conveyor belts and coasts you up to slides and back in the river again, you can literally ride the river through tunnels and transparent shark tank slides for hours without having to get off your tube.
                 I also was able to take them to Dubai mall in front of the 2km tall Burj Khalifa where they have a fountain that rivals (build by the same team) the one in front of the Bellagio in Las Vegas.  My brother missed out on that during my bachelor party so this made up for it (plus they played Michael Jackson -  Thriller).  I was so happy my brother came to visit, I think there were so many strange ideas going through the family about where we were and to have him come see our lives here meant a lot to me.  I'm also happy that he can go home and tell others about it and set the story straight about this place. 

             Before my brother arrived I also had planned the surprise for Sarah's 30th.  I had to call in a slight favor from one of my long term relationships I had with a customer service representative with
the Westin.  (If you are not aware I am very very picky about customer service in restaurants and hotels and will speak out if I sense anything I think falls outside the lines of quality and customer care.  But do not let that fool you, I am nothing but pleasant in my exchanges with the leaders I speak with.  I write up full constructive reports and stories about my experiences and in many cases are thanked repeatedly for my contribution.  They tell me how nice it was to offer my experience in such a constructive way and how my feedback can be used to make valuable improvements.  This behavior has earned me countless free dinners and night stays at many of my favorite vacation spots in the world.  Why is this relevant now do you ask?)  I needed Sarah's 30th to start with a bang, so I booked a room right in front of the Palm Island in Dubai the weekend Michael Buble was in town. I asked my friend at Westin corporate if he could give me an upgrade.  He said he would see what he could do, not sure what but it would be something.  When we arrived to check in we were greeted by the front desk manager and personally escorted to our room.  Much to my surprise we appeared in front of two double doors, when she opened them I was blown away.  The room was a two story penthouse with four balconies, a spiral staircase going to the master bedroom, a Jacuzzi, a steam room and a full size kitchen.  I had to act like it was all planned but I was just as surprised as Sarah was.  Needless to say Michael Buble was great, but I think Sarah enjoyed the room just as much.

Gazelle by our pool

In the desert after our Camel ride

              Our last note able experience was my surprise for Sarah one weekend when I drove her out to a different desert resort out in the Emirate of Sharja for the weekend.  Unlike the other resort we went to this one was meant to be much isolated.  With the Bedouin theme in mind, each hotel room is shaped like a tent and isolated from all other rooms, you get your own personal pool and breakfast served to your room in the morning.  The entire area is a preserve so as you enter there are animals (mostly gazelle and oryx) just casually walking all over the property.  When we were swimming in our pool we usually had two to three gazelle grazing a few feet away.  The booking also included two activities for the day.  We chose a sunset camel ride in the desert and the 5 am falcon hunting session.  The camel ride was ok, I'm not sure if I mentioned but I don't really like camels, but for some reason Sarah does so I take one for the team and hop on.  The falcon hunting session was way more fun for me, the explained how to train a wild falcon (I actually got to hold a falcon once at a work event as well) and how to feed them a just the right times to get them from flying off when you release them.  They also showed us this trained desert eagle (Owl) which also knew how to hunt to some degree.  After the activity we went back to sleep for a while before ordering our breakfast in bed, I was happy to order my favorite breakfast of all time: eggs benedict.  That was probably my favorite desert resort of the two we have stayed at mostly because of the wild life aspect, that was amazing.

Our Bedouin Tent Room

             Also how could I possibly forget, our newest member of the family, Maxim (Max) turned one this year.  Sarah baked him a tuna cake with a candle (I think he was hypnotized by the flame in the picture, as he can be seen contemplating his last year on earth).  I have not been the biggest fan of cats in my past, but I'll admit, I love that cat.         

              It has been a crazy past twelve months, but I have to say that we are still very much enjoying it here.  Our fascination and curiosity for the culture here and the many cultures that come to work here is still the same.  These two video's I posted below I think sum up two things.  The first gives the reason many people become expats to begin with.  It describes the journey an expat takes over time and what can happen if you are open.  The second video gives a good idea of what we see every day (this is how the locals dress and how they look on a normal day) but also the exposure to all the other cultures that are here too.  This is truly a unique place, no other place in the world like it.