Here we are at the Winter Olympics in Torino! We can't believe we had this amazing experience. We spent 5 days seeing a few events, walking through Torino, and exploring the incredible rolling hills of the Piemonte region of Italy. We learned that Torino is the Italian capital of chocolate, and as Grandma Esther has already said, it is some of the best we've ever had. We especially enjoyed the hot chocolate (ciocolato caldo) and a special coffee drink invented in Torino called Bircirin (beer-cheer-een). It was made with chocolate-hazelnut creme, espresso, and whipped creme - mmmm buonissimo! There were many other Americans there all dressed up in their red, white, and blue, Canadians, French (the mountain events were only 10 km from France), among others, of course, but those seemed to be the most overt fans. We also enjoyed some castle hunting (our favorite tourist activity here) which in this region included wine tasting - many of Italy's famous wines are produced here. We've also been busy with basketball, as one of Chase's new year's resolutions was to learn to play!
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You may recognize these "twin churches" from the Today show - this is
the Piazza San Carlo where the Today show broadcast from. It was
huge and gorgeous, and there were many similar throughout Torino.
We were lucky to catch the last few nice days before the snow hit, so
the weather was nice, cold, but not too bad. The mountain events
were an hour and a half to two hours from Torino up into the Alps
towards France, so any of those events were pretty much an all day
affair. The Olympic Mascots were Neve (snow) and Gliz (ice), and
the boys were constantly searching for them. Seeing them was the
height of the event for the kids! As you can see below, we got a
few snapshots with them, along with t-shirts, key chains, bags, etc! |
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 Our first event was Freestyle Moguls. We were surrounded by French fans! Everyone was really friendly, though, the olympic spirit was definitely present. Our second event was men's hockey - for Daddy, of course. We saw the US win their only game of the tournament against Kazakhstan. |
 And finally, the skeleton. We were standing 5 feet from the track and they screamed by at over 75 mph! This was an incredible event. It was at night and it was lightly snowing - and freezing! We could watch the sledder through the course and see the results on the big screen, and then watch them for a split second as they went by! |
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Here he comes around the bend! It's really amazing more of them don't get hurt! After seeing these three events, we were definitely ready to come home, but were so glad we had gone. Chase said he liked all the events the best - so that proves it - the trip was a hit! |
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