Zibello, our first night in Italy

We flew into Milan and then drove to Parma where we thought Trattoria La Buca, a small guest house, and the restaurant was located, only to find out when I asked for directions that is was ‘near’ Parma but about 45 kilometers away, in the country.  No problem you say, well, not exactly.  Our phones were not working and the Italian SIM card I had just purchased from Vodafone, an Italian cellphone provider would not be activated for 24 hours AND it was almost 5:00 pm and getting dark.  So with no GPS, evening fast approaching, we stopped about 4 times and Peg asked for directions.  Truth be told, I did not think we would find La Buca, but lo-and-behold we found it, down a small country lane in the middle of farm country.

When we entered the restaurant/reception area there was a little old lady, the owner, sitting at a desk, in the kitchen/bar nicely dressed with her pearls on and as calm as can be she said, in Italian, that she had been expecting us.  Another woman, also elderly came out of the kitchen and took us to our room across the alley, up two flights and insisted on carrying one of our suitcases…I would have none of it and she finally gave up but scolded me that she was capable of it.

After we settled in we went across the street again to the restaurant and had a lovely dinner.  The woman who showed us to our room also served our dinner and brought us a sample of her homemade spread, which had a bit of spice to it and was made out of pears and spread on the bread.  Next morning, we awoke, quite late, I guess the jet lag caught up with us and we thought we had missed primo colazione, or breakfast but when we went into the restaurant the owner was at the same table and said, when I said we were sorry for sleeping in, that it was not a problem and to sit down and enjoy our breakfast of cappuccino and a sandwich made with the local cured meat, culatello, butter, and bread.   A friend of the owners was visiting her and he spoke very good English.  He asked, how did we find this place since only people from their region knew about it.