Tivoli Truffle Dogs

Saturday is market day in Cortona and we walked into town at about 9 while it was still reasonably quiet to finally post our parcel, visit the market (we bought 2 Porchetta Panini for breakfast), have coffee and do a bit of last minute shopping before saying our goodbyes to our landlord and his wife.  And then off for our next adventure - Tivoli, 30km east of Rome.

It started to rain soon after we got onto the motorway, but cleared as we headed south through Umbria and to the outskirts of Rome, and the directions given to us by Jane and our landlord were perfect. We arrived just before 3 to our beautiful B&B and received the most amazing welcome imaginable - from our landlord, his 2 truffle dogs (Lagotto Romagnolos) who look like big bears with human eyes, and their 3 puppies who are just over 3 months' old.  I am in heaven!!

The puppies are absolutely adorable - all wrestling each other out of the way so that they can be closest to us - or sitting on us when they get half a chance.  And the father is only just over 1 year-old himself and such a huge boy who is just a  sooky, cuddly Fozzy Bear.  The mother is all white, loves to watch us but is very timid and won't come near us at the moment.  It has become my challenge to win her over!


Once we'd gone through all the formalities, spent some time chatting with our most delightful landlord and met his mother and his nephew, we unpacked and sat in the garden for about and hour.  Brian brought his diary up-to-date and I was completely occupied with the three babies.  And then tonight we played some of our music, sat in our large dining room and had a simple bowl of pasta and will be heading to bed nice and early in preparation for tomorrow's adventures in Tivoli.  

li.