Trip to Gardone, Val Trompia

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Uploading photos has been difficult, so yesterday’s comment about the scarf salesman appears in today’s photos.



Rainy and chilly, again. The umbrella purchase is paying off. Evidently March was wonderful here, in the 80s, but not now. Everyone is in their winter attire, down jackets, scarves, and hats.



Today, we rode a bus up to Gardone, Val Trompia, city in a valley north of Brescia that eventually leads on up to the Alps. The cities lie along the road in the bottom of the valley with hills/mountains going up from both sides. The purpose of this trek was to visit the Zoli gun factory where Art’s sporting clay rifle was made. Via email with a woman at the Museum of Weapons, I’d made a reservation to visit the factory, but I didn’t know exactly where it was or if they would look at me blankly and wonder what this old white lady was doing at their door. However, luck seems to ride with Sally and me. We asked the bus driver where Via Zanardelli was. He was from another town and didn’t know, but he asked one of the bus riders who knew and who pointed out where to get off. It was just beyond Beretta’s establishment which is way larger than Zoli. When we got off the bus we stopped a white haired gentleman who was jogging by, and he pointed down a street to the door of the factory. We were met by Giuseppe Zoli, the grandson of Antonio Zoli, the original owner. Giuseppe, now 82, had worked there since he was 14 years old. He said the factory was shut down during WWII. I’m not sure if Hitler didn’t want people making weapons in Italy or if the Americans shut it down after Italy surrendered. I didn’t ask. I think I got most of everything he said. Sally, who is not a gun person at all, bless her soul, spent the whole time taking photos. Giuseppe took me through the whole place and showed me the whole process from the blocks of metal, to the shaping of the metal parts, the addition of the wooden stocks, to the final assembly and testing for accuracy.



We thought about going on to Lake Iseo, but there was no direct transportation from Gardone to Iseo, so we came back to Brescia, snacked on prosciutto, cheese, and crackers, and decided to make this a day of rest before heading to Bergamo tomorrow to see my old friends Rosa Maria Rossi and Richard Stern. The weather is supposed to be nicer tomorrow, so today it seemed napping might be in order.

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Comments

[Val]

Enjoying your trip with you
Thanks for writing your blog Julia. I am totally enjoying it and it is almost like sitting down and chatting with you (although it would be nice to chat with you and enjoy a glass of wine too).