Where It All Began
Our story begins a long time ago (long before I was born), in a small Italian village in Abruzzo, where my grandparents, Ida and Ettore (seen in these two photographs), and their parents before them, were tending vines and making their wine on hillsides overlooking the medieval town of Gissi.
In post war Italy, cars were for rich people, and Ida and Ettore were not; they would get up at 3:00 am in the morning, and would set off with a donkey carrying all the necessary equipment. My grandparents would walk some 10km and work until 12:00pm, and then return home, weary from the days physical excursions, almost every day of the year, come rain or shine, just to make their own wine.
Where It All Began
Then I came along, and along came the tractors; the donkey was retired; but still, almost every morning for a few more years, my grandparents continued their work on the vineyards with the same commitment and the same pride that went into making their own wine and freely sharing their enthusiasm and knowledge of wine making with their grandsons.
In our family food and wine were not considered commodities, for us, they are one of life’s real pleasures to be savoured and remembered.
We have the same passion and commitment at Italyabroad.com, everything we import is made with love, care and with passion, from real people, with faces and with stories to tell, just like my grandparents.
