Life in Chianti in January is very quiet. There are hardly any tourists, many shops and restaurants close and when a cold wind like today whistles through the vineyards everyone is happy to stay home in front of chimney.

Of course, if you have a dog to take care of then you do need to leave the fire every once in a while (grrrr). But we’ve had some spectacular days:

And when you have the cutest dog in the world, how can you say ‘No’?!

Not that you ever would dare to say ‘No’ because she will EAT you:

This weekend we were going to have a pizza party for a friend’s birthday but he got sick unfortunately (hope you feel better soon John!) and so we ate a lot of pizza by ourselves. Everyone got to make one, or at least choose their toppings starting with a “Pizza Maialona” designed by Piri:

A heart-shaped “Pizza Vegetariana” collaboration from the Schmitt sister’s:

and a lethal concoction dreamed up by Guido with Nutella, banana and grappa which he then proceeded to light on fire in honor of the absent birthday boy. Unfortunately the picture doesn’t do it justice because it was pitch black except for the pizza flambé:

The absolute star of the evening was Bruno though. If he keeps this up we can enter him into the Junior Pizza Olympics soon:

He even figured out a trick to reflect light into the oven using his pizza paddle to check if the pizza was done.

The "Absent Birthday Pizza" before it got the grappa treatment from Guido.

You’re still here? How lovely to see you. Thanks for not abandoning us yet even after this rather long dry spell here on Paws on the Road. But it’s a new year and new posts are just waiting to be put up so let’s do this!

New Year’s was a grand party with Elvis, Satan’s dog and Molly the jolly panda bear all in attendance.

Ladies and Gentlemen, he's ALIVE!

You will do as I command human. Bring me a steak!

Ratzeputz anyone?

The rest of our time here in Italy has been taken up by work and the occasional slack lining session with our nieces and nephew.

Their favourite part was just sitting on the line and bouncing up and down until they all fell.

We hope 2012 found you all happy and healthy and that you’ll continue to follow our little adventures on the road. So far it looks like our travels will be less far-flung this year but you never know what might come up. And just because we’ll stay closer to home doesn’t mean it won’t be exciting! First stop: Switzerland, where we’ll try to find out how exactly DO they get those holes into the cheese?!

We were supposed to fly to Madrid today which was very exciting because even though we lived in Barcelona for 6 years, we never made it to Madrid. Not even once. So when we finally got our act together, bought a ticket and got all excited about seeing the Prado and the CosmoCaixa, let alone ride on the AVE to Barcelona in the perfect seats (right behind the driver!), imagine the let down when Eyjafjallajökull decided that now was an excellent time to spew some ash, cough up some grit and ruin the fun for everybody.

We haven’t given up on our trip to Spain yet (hello 10 hour car ride) but Madrid has been shelved once again. Maybe the powers that be don’t want us to see the Spanish capital for some strange reason? We’ll drive to Barcelona instead, see family and friends and gorge ourselves on calçots and other assorted goodies.

We’ll also be in Barcelona for Sant Jordi which is great fun because the Catalans are usually very good about celebrating their saints. Depending on the occasion there can be fireworks, picnics at the beach, special foods… In addition to being the patron saint of Cataluña, Sant Jordi has also become “the lovers’ saint” over the years and Sant Jordi is now celebrated much like Valentine’s day but with flowers for the women and books for men. Downtown Barcelona is decked out with long tables of books and roses for sale and there are special exhibitions all around the city about literature and Sant Jordi. We will definitely head to the Ayuntamiento de Gracia where they’re having an exhibition about a book called “La Merienda del Señor Verde” by Javier Sáez Castán.

And we’ll try to keep things more up-to-date here as well, even though we’re once again on a summer hiatus from ‘real travel’. Happy Sant Jordi everyone!

After we left England – what now seems like ages ago – we made a pitstop in Menèrbes at Sally’s house before going on to Italy and the long-awaited change of clothes since we were still travelling with our winter clothes at this time.

Menèrbes is the arch-typical Provençal village, with tiny little shops, a handful of delicious restaurants and views to die for. Just the place to relax after a long, long drive (London – Menèrbes: 14 hours).

With our bellies full of camembert and champagne, we drove to Italy and got our SUMMER CLOTHES! Yes, it was such a glorious moment to get our shorts and sandals that it warrants all caps.

For the rest of the summer we moved between Mallorca, Barcelona, France and Italy. In Mallorca we watched waterskiers take it to the next level

and some beautiful moon rises.

In Barcelona we heard, and sang, some Karaoke (note Alfred’s expert mic handling)

and wore as little clothes as possible in the heat.

We went to Bordeaux to see our friends Henri and Martha get married

and stayed to admire the street performers and cadillacs, in Cadillac, naturally.

Now we’re house-sitting for Conor’s godfather in Italy and even though the dogs, Red and Green, and the cat, Cat, are less than thrilled that their masters have gone on holiday for a weekend and left them here with two complete strangers, we’re enjoying our last few days in Europe. Where are you off to next, you ask? We’ll tell you all about it in the next post.