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June 9 was beautiful, sunny and clear - a great day to walk around Asti and celebrate Eric's birthday! Eric started out by getting a haircut at the local old-guy-with-straight-razor shop. It came out nicely - he doesn't look a day over 54, don't you think?
Asti is the "city of 1,000 towers" apparently (not the town of spumante anymore, despite me humming "Riunite on ice, Riunite so nice..." non-stop for two days), so we decided to start the day by climbing up one, the Torre Troiana
By poking the camera right up to the chicken wire guarding the top windows, we could get a shot of the other 999 towers. (There are actually five left)
Next stop, our local church, San Secondo. Quite old, nice art, hut sadly the tenth century crypt with the relics of S. Secondo himself remained closed throughout our visit.
A quick stop at another "top church" - this one high Baroque style. And you know what I say about Baroque...)
And then over to Asti's enormous Cathedral. It had a lot of our favorite elements, sheer size, Romanesque-ness, stripes, and great statuary. Inside it was mostly remarkable for being totally, echoingly empty except for a beautifully detailed fragment of an ancient mosaic that was found beneath the altar.
We also saw a couple of the town's Palazzi
One of which, the Palazzo Ottolenghi (of chef ancestry fame), had this intriguing coat of arms.
One of the highlights of the day was a series of old crypts that have been reinvented as a museum for all of the Roman and post-Roman ruins found around the city.
Including this sixth century crypt once used for secret Christian rituals.
And also to store vats of wine according to this old photo
Eric also hoofed it to yet another ancient crypt at the other end of town
While I checked out market day, to see what I could procure
for our home-cooked dinner.
BTW, lunch was yummy and cheap piadinis from Gina la Piadina.
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