More rain was forecast for today, and when we woke, the nebbia was the thickest it had been since our arrival two days ago. But we couldn’t let that stop us from exploring this area.

I had suggested we visit the small town of La Morra. It is said that it is one of the most panoramic points of the Langhe, “suspended between the Tanaro valley and the hills covered with vineyards that overlap as far as the eye can see.”

But before we went there, I also wanted to visit the Castello Grinzane Cavour, which meant driving a little closer to the town of Alba. It is a UNESCO heritage site that overlooks the Langhe area and has a museum as well as a wine tasting area. Sounded like such a good combination for us.

We drove through the township of Barolo on our way to the castle, looking for somewhere to enjoy a coffee. So did loads of other people. But we were all disappointed. Everything was “chiuso“.

Barolo is a cute village, and we will go back for a better look while we are staying in Novello. Like most of the villages around here, it has a cantina where one can taste the wines of the region. We also drove past a few wineries with signs indicating they were open for a tasting. It is only 6km from Novello, but the countryside is very different – with many more vineyards. Mick spotted lots and lots of grapes still on the vines – the winegrowers need the rain to stop.

We found a good parking spot in the small town of Grinzane – where the castle is located. And directly opposite was a small café where we were able to enjoy our coffees and the best cake ever according to Jeanie and Mick who both had a piece of hazelnut cake (almost sponge like) – a speciality from here.

This castle has a long and fascinating history, marked by continuous changes of ownership between counts and countesses, marquises, nobles and wealthy local families. But the link that made sense to me was the one that explained that Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour lived here in early 19th Century.

It was €5 each to enter this castle, and I think we all thought it was well worth it.

We watched a very informative video which re-enacted (part of) the life of Camillo Benso di Cavour from when he first arrived in the castle as a young man in 1832. He soon became the mayor of the small village of Grinzane at the age of 21, and then went into broader politics, holding a number of ministeries, and eventually becoming Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Savoy (Sardinia). In that role he was one of the architects of the unification of Italy. He died aged 50, and from what we watched on the video and saw in the museum, he packed a lot into those years.

We visited several rooms displaying equipment and information about the castle and the history of winemaking in the region.

It was still raining quite heavily while we were here, and so the best view I could get was from one of the arch (windows) on the top floor.

Eventually, Mick found what he was looking for.

There was a large selection of wines here, including quite a few museum wines – past vintages. What was a real ‘find’ here was a poster explaining past vintages, rating them as either ‘good’, ‘great’, ‘excellent’ or ‘outstanding’. The 2016 vintage was the best in the last 10 years, so Mick found a bottle of 2016 Riserva Barola that had his name on it.

Our next stop was in La Morra – the drive was spectacular even with the rain. We needed lunch by now and found one of the few open restaurants very close to where we could find a park and we all enjoyed pizza.

Mick and I had a full pizza each – we were hungry and this was our first in Italy on this trip, while Jeanie and Michael were more restrained and shared one. We all agreed that the pizzas were great.

La Morra is supposed to have the best views in the region.

On one side Monviso (the highest mountain of the Cottian Alps, located in Italy close to the French border, it is well known for its pyramid-like shape) and the Alps, on the other the rows of vines from which the Barolo wine is produced, of which La Morra is one of the most celebrated capitals. The best view can be enjoyed from Piazza Castello.

Now that Piazza happened to be less than 100m from where we really wanted to go. The Cantina Communale di La Morra. And it was here that we had the best experience ever. We met two young women who were hosting the wine tastings, which were more like the ones we have back in Australia where you get to taste very small samples which you can spit if you want to, also with some glasses of water. We were told that being high season it is usually too busy for ‘proper tastings’, but because of the rain it wasn’t. It was our lucky day! Normally we would have been poured samples of 4 to 5 wines and left to taste them on our own.

But not today.

For a fee of €10 each for tasting, the young woman (on the left) gave Michael, Jeanie and Mick a taste of more than 10 wines. I lost count, and I wasn’t even tasting.

But not only did they get to taste all these wines, the young woman was able to help them with the description of each of the wines, and explained their differences. I think they used around 6 glasses – she was keen to provide side-by-side tastings of the different wines. For example – three different Barolos, and so on. Nothing was too much trouble or for that matter, off the tasting list. If it was open, they could try it.

We didn’t end up spending much money in the cantina, but we did spend a lot of time. While we were there, some other patrons arrived, obviously knowing more of what they were after than we did. One French couple bought two 6 packs of wines they wanted for €800 (without tasting anything) and then decided to buy another bottle they did try for €60. The second young Italian women in the photo spoke to them in perfect French, after speaking with us in perfect English. Very clever.

Mick and I plan on returning to La Morra on Saturday as there is to be a special wine fair (called Autunno), featuring seven local producers. It sounds like fun.

After such a big day, I drove us home to Novello and we had a lazy few hours before enjoying a glass of a Nebbiolo our host had left for us in our apartment – as we plan on tasting those Barolos we bought today tomorrow evening.

Our last appointment was a mystery dinner at a restaurant 150m from our accommodation. But that experience needs its own post.

What a day!!