Yesterday we visited Francesca who will be helping us to get our gas and water contracts situated and our permesso started. She also helps with whatever we need so I have sent her numerous questions about things like bed sizes. They are not the same as in the US. Our mattress in our apartment seems too small for the platform. I am fine with making that our guest mattress but don’t know the sizes here. She can help.

Today we had coffee in the piazza with John and Libby, Americans who live in the hilltown near here called Montone. I have conversed with John for a long time and it was great to meet them! It was a beautiful morning and the Saturday market, which is more local producers was in full swing.

Next we decided to find another pet shop in Perugia. We plugged in the address into the GPS and it sent us right. Through. The. Middle. Of. Perugia (!) OK well we managed it and found a good tree for the cats to pick. On the way back the GPS took us through the middle of nowhere (I think she is schizophrenic). Lots of hiking trails, mountains, parks and we even found the Strada del Vino for Lago Trasameno. We stopped in a lovely winery/agriturismo and bought a couple of bottles. When we brought the cat tree to the flat they immediately, enthusiastically started to pick it. Happy days! They are very good about not picking furniture as long as we provide an alternative.

We ate lunch in and dinner out. The dinner was great, we sat outside and the weather was perfect, but way too much food! We ended up out in the Piazza for wine and grappa and Luther’s cigar. The Piazza is amazing. So much is happening from the old men playing briscola (Italian card game), to the little kids on bikes and chasing pigeons, to the table full of Brits to the 15 or so people watching the world cup. All this at around 10PM. Luther and I just looked at each other and agreed this is what we wanted. Our town is not that picturesque but it is a “real” Italian town with authentic activities. Yay, we love it.

Back to the flat to bed. Speaking of the flat. It has air conditioning but it has not been so hot that we have to use it. At night I open the windows on both ends of the living area and put the fans in and they pull in the cool overnight air. I shut the door to the zona di notte and we and the cats stay in there. I am afraid to let the cats get into the windows even though there are screens. We do sun management with the shutters, closing them when the sun is coming in and opening them when it passes on overhead. Then closing the back one in the afternoon. Works pretty well. I see we are headed for a streak of very hot weather so we shall see if we decide to use the AC. The cats with their long hair do suffer in the heat.

Tomorrow we are celebrating our friend Susan’s birthday at an agriturismo for lunch. There is an Arts on the Piazza in the afternoon and then there will be a group of us getting together for dinner. It should be fun!

Buonanotte!

We still had to lug three 40+ pound bags up 4 flights. We decided to take them to our own apartment and unload only what we needed to Susan and Gary’s apartment. We got a chance to look around our apartment. It was as charming as I remembered. I know we will be happy there once we get everything done. Here are some more pictures of the empty apartment:

Living Room – where the sofa will be. Those bookshelves need to be removed.

Other end of the room where the dining table is.

Office room

Guest bedroom

Existing kitchen.

Patio view to the Tiber river.

We showered and changed clothes and went out to Bar Mary and enjoyed a relaxing beer on the Piazza. There was a thunderstorm brewing so we hurried over to Susan and Gary’s house where we enjoyed a chat and a bottle of red wine. By the time we were finished the rain had stopped.

So the end of the arduous journey and onward to the new adventure!

Since my last post we did indeed pickup our passports with Visas at the Italian embassy. Check.

We have had a home inspection and have fixed everything but one. We have had a ton of rain here and the item that need fixing is a landscape issue. All of those folks are booked up for a couple of months. SO we are working on leaving cash so the new owners can handle that issue. Crossing fingers.

We have had a moving company come and move all of the furniture we are keeping and moved it into storage. Check.

We have nearly finished packing the two huge UPakWeShip boxes. We have scheduled pickup for Friday, 3 days away. Here is what they look like.

So far the jury is out on the UPak people. I do like Pete who helped me at the beginning. Alicia hasn’t been very responsive but today was better. Today I also found out that door to door shipping is not exactly what I expected. Alicia told me they deliver the giant boxes to withing 25 feet of our door. Being as our apartment is on a pedestrian street by the main Piazza, and 3 floors up I could not deal with that. We are also 63 year olds and cannot carry all that stuff to the 3rd floor. I contacted Pete and he is is working on it for us. I am having to change the way our shipment will be delivered so that someone will actually unload the boxes and take them to our apartment. Crossing fingers.

A friend is supposed to come this week to pick up a few items. Still have not heard from her when.

Our nephew is coming to pack our dishes, pots, and pans on Saturday and the truck comes Monday for the furniture. This leaves us time to vacuum and clean up, throw away the last of the stuff.

It has been an ordeal. Our closing is two days after the truck comes. We will stay with my sister for the week between the sale and 2 days before our flight over. The last two nights are in a hotel near the airport. We still have a car to sell. We will take it to CarMax the day before we leave.

If all that works we should be in Italy soon. Whew! I will be glad when it is all over.

Hi everyone! Today I got a congratulatory email from our agent, Jim. He said we are now the owners of Via Grilli 5 in Umbertide Umbria, Italy! So excited. Right away I printed out the COMPRAVENDITA REPUBBLICA ITALIANA or the final sale agreement. I wish I could have attended the closing. I heard it is not to be missed. Lots of stamping, and reading out loud all the documents in both languages. Sounds very Italian to me!

We have an appointment at the Italian Embassy next week on Wednesday where we will again present our documents, this time with the proof we own a home in Italy.

After the sale we had our agent let the seller know we would buy 3 of her furniture items she offered for sale but at a much reduced price that she asked. We shall see if she accepts. If not we’ll just go to IKEA in Ancona. We would have to go there anyway to get many other items we will need.

We just heard from our agent. Closing is set for May 13th. They will then send the ownership papers to us and we will schedule an appointment at the Italian embassy for our Visa. Getting closer!

So, I just got online and checked our Italian bank and the funds have arrived safely. We transferred the purchase price plus the fees and then some extra euro for necessary upgrades, furniture, and some running money in Euro. Too bad the exchange rate is not in our favor at all!

I sent a note to our agent (who is in Croatia on holiday). He will return tomorrow and I hope, will set up a date to close very soon. We are not sure how we will receive the final registered ownership document. Once we have that we can make another appointment with the Embassy.

Other things we are doing

The owner of the apartment, Elizabetta, has sent a list of furniture that she has decided she wants to sell to us. Her prices are very high. We may counter with lower prices. It is to her advantage to make a deal so she will not have to move it out. But if she won’t lower her prices I have alternatives. I did some research on Italian sites, primarily IKEA. I can get furniture that I like well enough for reasonable prices so that will probably be the way we go. We will need a sofa, chairs for the dining table, a double bed set with wardrobe and dresser and another dresser at a minimum. Then a desk for the computer and probably a sofa bed to put into the 3rd bedroom/office for extra guests and seating.

We also listed our house for sale here in Virginia. I spent a lot of time getting rid of things from all the closets and it looks pretty good now. We had some painting done etc. I hate living in a “staged” house but it must be done! Cross your fingers that it will sell soon!

We had 3 cars at the beginning of this year. As of this week we will be down to one car.

I am waiting a little while more before renting our UPackWeShip containers. In these we will bring some household goods and clothes. It is only 100 square feet so we can’t bring anything very large.

I am also renting a mailbox from an online company. It is interesting, they receive your mail and then scan it. You access a dashboard where you can view your mail. Then you can flag anything for the trash and have them send whatever you need to have physically in Italy. I hope it works!

I have chosen a moving company to pack up and move several items that we do not want to give away or sell. We will have them put into to a storage unit. These are family antiques etc. Who knows how long they will stay in storage.

I still need to have our cats microchipped and have the forms filled out by our vet. Another whole adventure, moving 2 cats to Italy!

That’s a short recap. Back soon!