There is no 'try'

A new month, a new city. Let’s take a look around. As always, you can click on any image to see it in eye-popping 3D!

The Piazza Castello in early morning, before the tourists have woken up. Supposedly Vermouth was invented on this spot. The Torinesi have all kinds of modestly nutty claims to fame. We have the longest marble-covered street in the world, we invented the breadstick, etc. It’s pretty funny. A little pathetic but funny.


Marta Bera has pretty much the coolest store in the world (“We have the coolest store in the world"), with just about every Italian delicacy you can think of. It’s on San Tomasso in the Quadrilatero, a maze of tiny cobblestone streets in the city’s Roman quarter. That’s what I’m exploring today. Marta’s sister, Bera, runs the coffeeshop across the street. Now that’s famiglia!


Uh, cobblestones. Stare at these too long and you’ll be trippin’.


Two things Turin has a lot of are shade and benches. This is a good thing for a traveler who needs to stop frequently to consult his map. The Quadrilatero is probably the shadiest nabe in town. All the buildings are five stories high, and because the streets are so narrow, sunlight has a hard time reaching the ground.


The base of an obelisk in Piazza Savoia. The inscription reads, “The law is the same for everybody.” Heh. Keep telling yourself that. It actually refers to some ecclesiastical bullshit and has no bearing on me, you, or anyone who hasn’t been dead for 150 years.

Turin’s best-loved church, the Santuario della Consolata, dedicated to Maria Consolatrice, whose stage name was Our Lady of Consolation. It was the 1678 brainchild of Guarino Guarini, the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather of Justin Guarini. And if you know who Justin Guarini is, well, Miss Maria weeps for you.


The interior is impossibly fussy. I’m sitting off to the side during the 8 a.m. Mass, hoping nobody notices my Gorillapod-mounted Fuji F480.


I like the composition and how she's standing. It's not her bike, but she looks like she's thinking about it.


Shadows and light on Via Bonelli. This might look good in black and white.


Your host. Yes, I'm the idiot who wears brown lace-up shoes and a wrinkled camp shirt with dress pants.


These fountains are everywhere, and the water just runs constantly. Because we’re at the foot of the Alps, water conservation just isn’t an issue here. God, I’m such an Arizona nanny. It tastes really good though.


The Duomo, where the shroud is kept. If you were here in April you could have seen the purported burial cloth of Christ. It may be another 10, 20 years before it goes on display. Radio-carbon testing at my alma mater, the University of Arizona, shows the cloth to be a fake, but let the folks have their fun. It’s not a remotely fetching church; the proportions seem out of whack. Guarini has his fingerprints on this one, too, so blame him. It opened in 1498, so let’s call it a Renaissance structure, which makes it kind of an odd duck in Baroque-centric Turin.


We may not get as brilliantly clear a day as this for the remainder of the trip. The Duomo is at left, and its accompanying belltower, built in 1470, is at right. A tiny moon is at lower center left.


Jesus was just a twinkle in God’s eye when this baby went up. The Porto Palatina, the northern gate to the city under Roman rule, circa the first century B.C. Because it is so old, I just had to touch it. It was warm.


It’s guarded by … darn, I can’t remember his name. The guy who invented that salad. Chavez? Romero?


This picture describes Turin better than the others. Eleven miles of these porticoes are in the city. Seriously. You never have to get wet or sunburned. This was a city built, literally, for kings, and we are the modern-day beneficiaries. I hope “portico” is the right word. I don’t think a “colonnade” has a roof, and an “arcade” is enclosed on both sides. Right? Let’s just say “portico.”


Back home in my kitchen, which opens up onto a balcony, where I whipped up some penne cacio e pepe for lunch. Not sure what to tackle next. Either brave the streets on my bike or order gelato. Both prospects make my palms sweat. But to borrow from Yoda, “Do … or do not. There is no try.” And do I shall. Thanks, little man.