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We spend the morning at the market bumbling our way through purchases of fruit that actually smelled like fruit, gnocchi and fresh pasta, cheese, prepared salads. The prosciutto and a chicken stuffed with forcemeat of chicken and asparagus was lovingly sliced as thin as paper and gently wrapped.
We had no trouble getting to the Avis office to pick up the car and find a “be back soon” sign in the window. We reminded ourselves that this is Italy, and prepared to wait. Fortunately, we only had to wait a few minutes and we were on our way in a Lancia that Jack hated. We headed for Citradella a walled city north of Padova with dreams of a picnic lunch and a stroll along the top of the walls. When we reached Citradella, we couldn’t figure out how to get up on the walls and the only place we could find for our picnic was a bench in the shade in the middle of a market. All was not lost because the market was closing and we got to watch how the trucks collapsed the large cloth awnings that extend out from all sides of their trucks to provide shade
when they set up their wares.
In the afternoon we had a tour booked at Bisol, a major producer of Prosecco. We arrived much to the surprise of the staff since the employee who usually gives the tours was on vacation, so the tour guide was the Export Manager. After what I learned about Prosecco, I’m a convert and will drink a lot more of it. Twenty-one continuous generations of the Bisol family have been producing Prosecco for the family since 1528 and commercially since 1740. Our guide explained that the business is passed from father to son and when I asked if it would ever be passed to a daughter, she assured me that there was never a shortage of sons. They export to 67 countries including the US, although for us to buy it we’ll have to order it online. After a tour of the production facilities and the cellar, we had a tasting of four different Prosecco of varying sweetness. I didn’t know that “Prosecco” is an “appellation controlee” and only comes from the limited area where the Bisol is located. The land in the appellation is owned by a small number of families and if
any of it was ever sold, it would sell for about $2 million euros/hectare (2.5 acres).
Our tour guide at the winery recommended another walled city as an interesting place to stop on our way back to Padua. The town was small and most of the wall had not survived. Jack was distracted, so we decided to head back. Up until now WAZE had worked perfectly so we put our trust in WAZE and headed back about 5:30. Unfortunately, we had neglected to enter “Padua” after the street address, so after a confusing drive we arrived at the right address in the wrong city. By this point we had missed the closing time of the Avis office and couldn’t figure out how to call them. We tried again and ended up at a different Avis office and poor Jack was not at all happy. I would have to give myself a “C” as a navigator. At a certain point the whole situation struck me as comic, but Jack was in no mood for humor and since he was driving I kept quiet. We decided to keep the car overnight and turn it in the next morning since
the Avis office was near the train station and we’d be heading into Venice by train. It actually turned out well because our dinner reservation was at a restaurant that was in the suburbs. It had a one star Michelin restaurant in Padua that had a Bistro associated with it that served many of the same dishes. The meal was very good and our server was charming. Having been educated about Prosecco, I noted that the bubbles in the Prosecco I was served had big bubbles, a sign of an inferior product. Really good Prosecco has tiny bubbles that rise from the center of the glass.
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