I’ve got just a few weeks before the entire family : Steve(husband),
Chelsea (22 year old daughter) and Ryan ( 17 year old son); leaves Texas for our maiden trip to our new
vacation home in Guardia. Everyone is very
excited and I am a bit nervous as I worry a bit .. will everyone love it? how will everyone survive without tv’s and Xboxes?
The house is completely ready (Thank you Pasquale!) as we’ve
added another bed in the second bedroom (picked it up 2nd hand) and
added a fold out couch. So we can sleep 6 people comfortably now. The internet is
up and functioning completely so the idea is to take a 10 day family vacation
and then Steve and I will work from Italy and extend our stay to a full month.
While the last few trips have been about getting the house
ready, this trip will be all about sightseeing and taking many day trips to soak
in as much of Italy as possible. My
shortlist so far includes:
The Amalfi Coast
Isle of Capri
Ruins of Pompeii
Naples
Rome – all of it!
Hiking in Matesse
The Palace in Caserta
The thermal baths in Telese Terme
The list keeps growing, and we’ll likely run out of days and
hopefully leave excited about the next time we return. I want to keep a healthy balance between
enjoying the quiet pace of Guardia and trying to see everything at once. (which
is traditionally how I’ve attacked our family vacations). So no real agenda..
just possibilities.
Just as the last time I was in Guardia, our good friends the
Orso’s are excitedly waiting for the arrival of the entire family! The other expats are exchanging emails daily,
comparing who is going to be in guardia on what days to see which days are
overlapping, and of course the party planning has already begun in full force!!!
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Can't wait to get this gang back together this summer!! |
This summer, Guardia will be abuzz with 7 different families
(all will be there at the same time!) that have purchased homes in Guardia in the
last few months.. It has been a labor of love for many, thank you so much to
the people of Guardia who have taken us in like family and made it feel like
home from day one!
Writing this blog is such a joy for me because it is a small
way to say thank you to a community that has been so kind, welcoming, and
generous to me, and has given me a wonderful creative outlet!!
Currently a small collaborative non-profit US/Italian “live”
production is under way.. not sure if there will be anybody listening, but
it should prove to be great fun and another opportunity to do and learn
something new! I’ll keep everyone posted
on the progress.
I will leave you all with some of the must see highlights
that I absolutely will not miss:
Ciao!
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ReplyDeleteI found your blog while looking for property in Guardia Sanframondi. I can't believe that you were able to get it all together so quickly.
ReplyDeleteMy great grandfather was born there, and moved to NYC in 1895, got married, had kids, etc. I've been toying with Italian citizenship via jure sanguinis (right of blood) for over 10 years now. There are lots of documents that need to be collected and translated and it requires somewhat of a commitment. Nobody else seemed to be too eager to help, so it sort of dropped to the bottom of my priority list.
Then, about 4 years ago I got the bug again. I got my father's italian singing teacher, Jacinto, to see if he could help. He called the city to see if we could get a copy of my great grandfather's birth certificate. He spoke with the mayor, and they became good friends and have kept in contact (and we got a birth cerfificate!). Unfortunately life got in the way again and the passport became a low priority.
So about a week ago, my dad called and he and Jacinto seemed eager to make a trip to see if we could expedite the citizenship, so we may be heading over next year at some time. The "Morone" family seems to be concentrated in the Benevento area, so it will be interesting to see if I can find some distant family there.
More importantly my wife and I agree, that this should go to the top of the priority list. I'll be 50 next year. My kids are all pretty much grown and off doing their own thing. I work from home and as long as I have an Internet connection I can work from anywhere, so who knows. We may end up living there! I'll keep you posted!
Andrew, We've been in Italy in our house for the past month, partly vacationing and partially working. We have full internet so we've been able to get everything done that we need to. I need to update the blog, but have been so busy just enjoying our time here that I am hardly on the computer other than to keep up with work. The people in the town of Guardia have been incredibly helpful to us and have made the transition incredibly easy.. Please keep in touch and let me know if you have any questions.
ReplyDeleteI hope you don't mind if I ask how much taxes do you have to pay yearly for the house. Do you have to pay for utilities for the full year even when you are only there for a few months a year? My husband and I are planning to buy and I am just trying to figure out how much I should have on hand to
ReplyDeletecover cost for the house and all taxes and fees. Thank you so much for your time
Hi Maria, I just got my first tax assessment and the value of the house is so low that I did not owe any taxes this first year. my utilities are very low. My electric is about 60 to 25 euros per month.. we will see what the bill is after we lived full time in the house for one month. The water is less than that. We have a phone line and internet for about 50 euros per month. We have all the utilities connected to a credit card and that is how we are taking care of paying our bills. Please feel free to ask any other questions you might have.
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