Il Dolomiti

We finally made it to “Il Dolomiti” Sunday afternoon. Jane found our hotel nestled halfway up the hillside in the ridiculously quaint village of Ortesei. “We have a problem,” the receptionist said with a frown when I told her my name. Oh no, my heart said in a small voice...

Turned out the apartment we had reserved would not be available until the next day. The guy who was in it had broken his leg and could not re-arrange his travel until then. Meanwhile, they had a much smaller apartment we could use for the night. Many apologies...

The small room was not so bad. We expect small in Europe. Two windows looked out on the hillside behind the hotel and I could look up at the flower bedecked hotels above us. We settled in as best we could and had a late lunch in town overlooking the beautiful valley.

We walked around town which is very touristy, but hey, we are tourists and who doesn’t love flowers and gelato??

Back at the hotel, I signed up for the internet and we ran into a glitch. For some reason, our phones and Rick’s IPad would all see the hotel’s internet site, but my laptop would not. This means Rick can’t use it to play with his GPS and I can’t use it to write blog notes or upload photos. I tried uploading a pic from my phone to facebook, but it wouldn’t work. This note I am writing now may have to wait for Zurich to be posted.

This morning, I used our little kitchen to cook up a veggie and cheese omelet but couldn’t get the coffee maker to work. We still couldn’t get into our new room so decided to take a drive around the biggest peaks. It was a bit of a whirlwind as we needed to be back to move our stuff and also the internet guy was going to be by this afternoon.... But gorgeous! Amazing views. It is possible here to take a gondola to a ridge top, hike around a bit, take another gondola back down the other side of the ridge to another town, explore that town, and take a bus back to where you started. Why not?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...our new room was ready. I peaked through the open door, through the big room and out the double glass doors to the balcony and the view beyond. Really? I double checked the room number and the key in my hand... Really? The kitchen/living room was bigger than the whole of the other room. There is a nice sized bedroom as well, a large sparkling bath, and a very cute closet with bunk beds, which would have been “Bob’s room.” But the view... Oh man. Rick got in a short ride, I got in another walk about town, and then it was dinner on the balcony at sunset. Photos at link below.

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