January l, 2006. Last night’s dinner was absolutely fabulous! Sylvia is nothing short of awesome. She is literally 5 stars. We applauded her when she came down the stairs this morning. What a wonderful opening event to the project, happy everyone was finally together! Lots of laughs. I take my dictionary everywhere. JC and I constantly referred to the Italian; as when Egedio serves & speaks, he goes fast.

Today we walked to Fenestrelle from Mentoulles on the mountian road, almost an hour’s journey. Beautiful sharp & sunny out, a “hills are alive” kind of majestic day. My new ski pants worked just fine, I was steaming! Jaz and Eric followed and all of us were at the fort together at last. It’s exciting. We begin tomorrow.