I really could write all day about the “hows and whys” of family trips. I am remiss in my documentation duties. I looked back and saw that I had not shared much about the trips we have taken over the last year. But, then again, I notice I take fewer pictures as well. Something gets comfortable, and you become more relaxed as familiarity creeps in. It’s nice, but when you get home, you have less to work with if you want to make a photo book.
Here are a few segments of thought about the trip to Italy 2026. If you were there, the logistics matter. Actually, if you were there, you don’t need my version of the story; you have your own memories, and I am going to guess they are as powerful as mine were back in 2023.
Logistics:
I just flew back… And boy, are my arms tired. I love that joke. Sounds like something I heard on the Carson show when I was a kid.
In February of 2025, I wrote a post about our trip to Italy in 2024. You can read it here: https://www.planetstahl.com/3680-2/
It was our second trip to Italy in two years… We brought our friends, the Brodahls and toured Roma and had a great visit with my Italian “cousins”. I call them cousins because we are talking 5th and 6th level extended family from my Great Grandfather Giancarli. The blood would seem thin at the level of relation, but the Giancarli family and the Italian patriarch, Luigi, have all stayed in the Tivoli-Roma vicinity. This has made for an accessible family group over the years for my Aunts and Uncles, who have preserved this relationship.
In that post linked above… I told the story of seeing Luigi in Tivoli at a grand family lunch. Luigi was looking at me, very determined to ask me something. I pulled David over and had him interpret. “He wants to know where the Detroit Giancarli’s are?” I like to think that is the moment that the ball started rolling. I told that story. I wrote it down (in a bit of an effort to shame others!) and we talked a lot about going to Italy again. This past Summer, when the family gathered in Michigan (I was out of vacation!) for a week at the Giancarli lake house, a plan was hatched. My folks, siblings and the Aunts and Uncle would be up for a trip. I only asked that it be on Aidens Spring Break from Carthage, as he is in his Sr year and I fumbled that ball with school schedules over the years.
We travel on shoulder seasons. Rome and most of Italy have great savings on airfare and hotels if you travel in the spring or fall. We have gone in November the last 3 years and the Thanksgiving week has been ideal for time off and Aidens schedule.
All that said… We did it.
My cousin Chris, his Wife Annette, and their two kids, Dominic and Gillian, made the trip. I fulfilled my family duty and then some. My Mom has met a few of these people when they came to the United States in the 1970’s. 50 years??? Wow. Mom, Dad, and my brother Don, his Wife Dawn, and my Sister, Sylvia, all came along for the trip.
They all did it right. Aiden, Angela and I did the trip in 7 days. (Aiden in 6). I knew the family would hit all the touristy spots, but I was not prepared to see their extensive itineraries! Venizia, Firenze, Roma, Beffi and Assisi. Awesome! While working the week before we left, messages started showing up in our family group chat that Venice was actively stealing hearts.
That was tough, I love Italy, and now I regretted my choice of a short trip. I suffered through for a few more days until our plane left Peoria on Sunday. (Our flight, the moment it started with some poor customer service at United, was a back and forth of delays and lost baggage. A story to tell to anyone who loves travel horror stories) Angela and I landed in a well-trodden Venice. My Detroit cousins and the Mackinaw Stahls had been there up until our arrival. At one point, we ran into a random store clerk who remembered my family and the Giancarli surname. How great was that?
I let Aiden fly directly to Rome by himself. He did end up sharing a flight and taxi with my Sister on Monday. His e-sim was not loading for some reason, so Aiden did the whole trip to Rome on hotel wifi and memory. I am impressed, but I had no doubts that he can handle Rome even if he only had cash and no phone. He IS a better traveller than I was at his age for sure (I’ve been training him his whole life!) He had his own hotel for a few days until we showed up on Thursday.
Interuption of thought:
This is totally a blog. Sorry. Just making logistics notes about the trip… But my family knows all of this. I want to write about my cats killing birds at an unprecedented rate in my garage. It’s getting unnerving since they seem to exclusively kill Cardinals. State agents or local St Louis baseball fans might start asking about the “hate” that is coming from the Timmies.
Family days:
Thursday afternoon, Angela and I got to Rome while everyone else was busy on tours. Gianna asked if anyone wanted coffee at the museum near her work… Angela and I, along with Don and Dawn, ran over during the worst weather day of the trip. Anytime you can have someone one-on-one with family, it’s worth it.
Friday and Saturday of the trip were the big payoff. No pressure.
Friday, I rented two vans for the family to make their way to Beffi and see the original Giancarli home. I rented the vans 2 months ahead, but I still had anxiety that something would go wrong. The vans were early at our hotels, and the drivers were super friendly and spoke English.
Hurdle jumped, anxiety level down.
Beffi is a very small village two-hour drive into the mountains. It’s not glamorous. Its a small jumble of home on a hillside. The Giancarli house… It’s a stable. That’s being generous.
The home that was shared by my great-grandfather and his siblings is nothing more than a few rooms in a stone structure that must have been horrendous in cold or hot weather. The area is filled with amazing beauty, but you have to imagine that the conditions, like any mountain area, can have extreme swings. What did they pack around those wood doors to keep warm in the winter?
When we were in Italy on our road trip last November, I had rented a car. This gave us a more personal view of the countryside, and I marvelled at the quaint beauty of the small towns between Pacentro and L’Aquila. But 100 years ago, this was not a wonderful place to live. Living in a stone home with no power or water in the mountains was a recipe for poverty. So much so that a few of my family members left everything and came to America.
These are the things I am thinking when I am driving. I’m psychotic.
Could I do that? Could I drop everything and move to a new land with nothing in my pocket, no language and no place to live? Ha! I can’t even imagine. 
This town and this “stable” are the wellspring. It’s one of them, I’ll never know the others as I had limited knowledge of family on the other ends of the tree. It’s amazing that we still have a line of communication with this family, which makes these trips possible.
Beffi was full of surprises this trip. A neighbour came down the hill, opened up a shared cellar, started pouring his homemade wine, and pulled out a ham and sausage that he had been aging. OMG. It was ridiculous. You could not have paid for this experience. All the while, as the keeper of the clock, I am freeking out that the family will not see the whole town and tower. By the time we had our cuts of meat and wine, we had a few minutes to see the Giancari hovel.
It’s never enough time, and I always want to go back to this spot.
We left Beffi and headed to a local restaurant (that I have been to before, so I was ready for the never-ending lunch), Del Rio and met with more family. Luigi’s sister, Maria Pia and her daughter Stefania and brother (argh! names?!?!).
Again, its not enough time! I have met most of these people before, so I sat at the other end of the table to let the new visitors have their time, but I really wanted to chat with Mariano, Stefania and meet the others. But, it’s a no-win. Rossana (who I am happy to spend all day with!) Carla and I sat down by the drivers (Who were awesome BTW “BEST ROME DRIVER” if you ever need a black van for a day).
Saturday we all climbed on a train in Roma and headed up to Tivoli. This is the town were Luigi lives with Anna and Laura, his daughters I met back in 2023. Mariano found a restaurant in the city center that could seat our massive group. It was about a 30-minute walk from the train station, but you need to know that every corner of this town, like all of the older city centers, is all eye candy, and a walk is preferred.
This was my first chance to see Pietro. We talked about his business, and I gave him no end of grief about cancelling his trip to the US this year. He took it like a champ. Again, not enough time, I feel like one-on-one time is the most valuable time spent.
Luigi was back again, along with Pietro and Gianna’s boys, Lucca and Andrea
Lunch was near-never-ending again. Two days of this will make you look swollen in all your vacation photos… My God, did we eat!
We spent as much time as we could at the restaurant, mingling. The photo below is the whole family just outside the restaurant. We ran to the train with minutes to spare and swarmed one car for the whole family. Meanwhile, the Italian family waved goodbye through the glass as we left the station. I was sad. Tim was sad. He cried. We all laughed. Thanks, Tim!
Saturday night bonus… A message came from Uncle Joe that Anna and Laura had come to Rome and were at their hotel for a visit.
I nearly got attacked! lol. Kinda! Anna read me the riot act for not stopping last year during our road trip. I was not ready for this! I had to remember all my excuses! And I did have a few. First, I was afraid to show up at their place with no contact ahead of time… Second, I didn’t know she spoke that much English… Third, I struggle so hard to understand Luigi or get help with translation that I did not want to drop in and frustrate anyone. (4th, and I am not sure the Italian family understands this… I travel without an agenda a lot. We never really knew what day we would be stopping and where. At one point on our trip, I was sure that NOT having chains for my rental car would force me into a detour back down towards Naples. I did reach out to Stefania, but we missed each other by an hour for a visit with her and Maria Pia)
The Anna guilt was refreshing. Sometimes I feel like we are pushing our luck when we visit. “Who are these Americans who keep coming back to our country to bother us?” I don’t like to be a bother, and I am sure that’s what they are saying to each other when I send a message about future trip plans. I am happy to hear that someone is adamant about us visiting! LOL. Message received. (Let’s be honest, Rossana and Gianna (because the husbands aren’t the messengers) have always been great at planning get-togethers!)
Wrap Up:
I think it was a success. I am sure everyone is going to look at their credit card receipts when they get home and determine how much fun they had after taking a peek inside the envelope! 
Even if you never go back, you have done something that many of us have talked about our entire lives. You went to Beffi. You have seen Rome. The Vatican, yeah, that’s beyond comprehension. We made it to Venezia. Venice is a dream. Seriously. You have to go. High-speed rail from Venice to Rome makes you wonder what is wrong in this country, just like the 3 Euro train ride from Rome to Tivoli. Realizing that you can walk 20,000 steps for days on end is a hard pill to swallow when you get home and struggle to get 5k while working. (thats my hard takeaway) Lastly, airports. My God, O’Hare is a hot mess compared to those Italian, German and Swiss airports. The food. Better than most restaurants. The planning and layouts make sense.
All of this to say, you have widened your worldview. 
People are not happy with the US and the current state of the Iran “excursion”. From the man who asked us “Not to bomb Italy, we are your friends” to my cousins worried for their son who works in the Middle East at a gas plant. War and peace matter a lot more when you live near the front lines. I heard a lot of this about Russia and Ukraine years ago… And it stuck with me that there are lives affected by the decisions we make here.
When I made the toast (not my idea BTW) on Thursday night, I wanted to drive home this point. We know our immigrant story. What would the man who left the town of Beffi with nothing think of the accomplishments and wealth generated by his legacy? Do we make him proud?
Climbing down off the soapbox… Thinking about getting back on… Nevermind.
Fun, family, food, history, spritzes and Arrosticini. It’s the best. I want to go back. I want to spend a month. Or two. LOL.
There is never enough time.
