Valle Maira & Su Per Stroppo
Valle Maira
We spent the last hot hectic days of May moving from our tourist apartment to our house in Neive. How we accumulated so much stuff in 4 weeks is beyond me.
We made a reservation last fall in a beautiful place in the mountains – Casa dei Fiori. It is in the town of Morenesio in the area called Stroppo. Last year we participated in the event called Su Per Stroppo – Up For Stroppo. It is a fundraiser for the area and is a perfect day of hiking, eating and drinking in one of the most beautiful settings I have ever seen. So we wanted to be sure to come back.
Valle Maira is a valley that is a part of the Southern Alps that is only about an hour and a half from our new town. It is one of the only valleys that does not have road access to France, so it is much quieter and less developed than the valleys to the North and South. Historically this valley is on one of the ancient salt roads where people would travel across the mountains to the sea to bring back fish, salt and olive oil. So the cuisine here, and throughout the Northern part of the Piedmont region you find anchovies and fish in many of the popular regional dishes.
This valley also has falls and grand rock formations that rival Yosemite (well, almost), and is very popular for rock climbers. The most popular time is the summer when people from all over Europe flock to the oceans and mountains to beat the heat.
So, we literally tossed all of our belongings into a pile in the house in Neive and took off for the mountains. We were pleased to be joined by our friends from the States Dick & Nancy Ponzi. They had been planning on coming to the Piedmont Region anyway and it coincided with our trip to the mountains, so they added hiking shoes to their bags and came along. As Nancy said, “When I looked on the Internet and found there were only 164 residents, how could I say no?”
The hike begins at an assigned time in the morning in the center of town with a glass of prosecco, a nettle frittata and some bruscetta with anchovy sauce before taking off up the hill. The hike seems to change somewhat each year, and this year it was a bit more demanding in the uphill climb. The second stop was at a church mid way up the hill, we saw several Italian friends at this stop with Arneis and salami before heading further up the hill to Ruta Valle where we had a fantastic stew and zucchini with Nebbiolo before rounding the corner to our town Morenesio for cheese (we are in the middle of cheese country here!) and Barolo and Barbaresco and finally off to the Santuaria d’ Santa Maria for dessert a dessert prosecco, coffee, cookies and grappa! This hike warrants much more detail, but you get the idea.
We started each day with a hike and did our best to rest and relax. The longer we are here the more we realize how much we have to learn. Italy is broken up into (I think) 21 different regions that are defined for specific regional, geographical or cultural reasons. Several of the regions were at various times attached to different countries depending upon who won or lost a war. Each of the regions has it’s own unique dialect. We have begun learning a few Piedmontese words or phrases, and as a friend says, “I was never taught Piedmontese in school, we only spoke it at home, and now just my parents speak it with each other.”
So now in Valle Maira we find ourselves in Occiton country, a part of the Piedmont region, which is seen as an even more ancient culture than Piedmont culture. The dialect here is greatly influenced by French and even sounds French when you hear it spoken. So, we have even more to learn, but, we keep going one layer at a time and that is good.
Ciao
Donna