not a shroud in sight

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Up very early and on the 2 hour train journey to Turin. Picked up a map and headed to the nearest stop for the hop on /hop off tourist bus, only to miss it by a couple of minutes as I was buying a bottle for water. As it turned out it was for the best as I followed the map to the municipal centre and came across a stunning square which I wouldn’t have been able to access via the bus tour. The Piazza San Carlo was surrounded by beautiful buildings and Churches with merchant houses and ornate fountains for decoration. Further up I cam to the Castello and the RealePalace which were both lovely too. The 1^st world war memorial was also there and I grabbed a coffee and sat outside a café watching the world go by whilst waiting for the bus. The open top bus went a long way out of the centre up into the hills surrounding the town and it led to some lovely views over the river and the town in the distance. It then drove out to the Olymic Villiage where the winter games were held in 2006. The stadium was originally used for the 1933 fascist games and had been completed by a new arch and Olympic village. Crossing the River Po we came to the old Fiat factory – lingotto with it’s famous race track on the roof. It is now a shopping complex and the new fiat factory and automobile museum is further out. I met an Australian woman who was on her own too so we had lunch at the oldest café in Turin (famous for tiny sandwiches) and swapped travel stories which was nice. Turin was very beautiful, quite distinct from other Italian cities in that it wasn’t very un down…. No sight of the famous shroud of course.

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