This week we are on tour as a family in Italy. We had to make a decision about what to do for our summer holidays as it didn’t appear that the UK were going to change the rules about vaccinated expats / tourists being allowed in without quarantine. We decided to go back to Verona, where we have been twice before to the same agriturismo. We knew that the owners of the agriturismo would handle the situation really well and the standard of accommodation is always excellent.
I filled out our online digital passenger locator form and we set off just after 6am on Monday morning. Sat nav reckoned it would take us 5 hours and 20 minutes but this route was going through the Gotthard Tunnel which we were going to avoid. Driving through the San Bernardino Tunnel does add on around 50km but we have never had to queue there and the views at the southern end are stunning.
The journey was going well until just before we got to the Italian border. Sat nav was telling us to take an exit into Chiasso itself instead of staying on the motorway. At this point the motorway looked clear and the traffic was flowing well. We made the decision to ignore sat nav and carry on along the motorway – bid mistake! The traffic came to a standstill just passed the motorway junction. If we had been a few minutes later we would have seen the queueing traffic. We were now stuck in the queue!
Going across the border itself was no problem. There were no passports checks and, more worryingly, no Covid certificate checks. The border police were just standing around looking bored.
The main hold up came in the roadworks just south of the border as one of the tunnels was closed and everyone had to move into one lane. The rest of the journey went well and we were going to be early arriving at the agriturismo. Check in was anytime after 3pm.
We stopped for a break in the small town of Pescantina and found a cafe to get a drink. After this we drove to Negrar but stopped on the wat at a shopping center with a Lidl as we had been told that Italy was great for gluten-free food. Lidl was a complete let down, but in the same shopping center there was a pharmacy that had more gluten-free food than we had ever seen in one place. Bethany was very happy and immediately picked up a number of products she had never seen before.
We also decided to stop at our usual supermarket, Famila, as we were still to early for check in. This supermarket also had a great range of gluten-free food including donuts and muffins. Bethany was in seventh heaven!
We made our way up the winding road to Agriturismo Canova and were warmly greeted by Francesca, even if we were still 10 minutes early. Our rooms were ready and she pointed us in the right direction. This time we were in the new section of the building and had two interconnecting rooms on the first floor.
As always the rooms were excellent and we had a bathroom for each room (both were large and ours even had two sinks). This made the whole ‘apartment’ bigger than the ones we had stayed in before and Bethany had a huge double bed instead of having to fold the sofa bed out every night.
There is a small kitchen area in the bigger room with a two ring hob and all the kitchen equipment needed to make stove top meals. Both rooms had fridges so Bethany had somewhere to store her food purchases too.
We unpacked and had a quick dip in the pool to cool off. Unfortunately practically as soon as we got in it started thundering and lightning. It looked like it was getting closer to us so we beat a hasty retreat.
The weather brightened up pretty quickly and we managed to get out for a quick walk so I could top up my step tracker. Difficult to do 10,000 steps after spending most of the day in the car. Not too much of a chore with the stunning views.
I had already done some online research into local restaurants offering gluten free items on their menu and had found a pizzeria / restaurant in a nearby village that offered gluten free pizza. We had already decided to order to take away on the first night so we could relax. After discussing with Francesca, I also found out that the pizza takeaway in Negrar also offered gluten free pizza across its whole menu. We arranged for Francesca to order the pizzas for us so we could collect at 7pm.
When we arrived at the takeaway at 7pm our pizzas were ready and smelled really good. We drove home quickly to ensure we could enjoy them while there were warm. We had ordered one with sausage, one with ham and the third with grilled vegetables.
They tasted really good and it was definitely the best gluten-free pizza base that we have had so far. As we had had a long day it was time for an early night to be ready to enjoy our holiday.
Crouch Family On Tour 