The next day, we started with a hearty breakfast at the Art Hotel Commercianti where I was surprised to see candy being served for breakfast.
Then it was time to begin our quest for a laundromat. By now, Pokin and Nicholas were low on clean underwear. I told them if they just wore a tunic like I did and stopped being so reliant on pants they wouldn’t be in this kind of predicament. Of course they didn’t listen.
After setting in, we decide it’s time for some lunch. We started exploring around until we found a charcuterie place. It kinda just looks like what we normally eat at home.
Bologna is also known for Le due torri, or the Two Towers, built in from 1109-1119 by the Asinelli family. I don’t know what it is with Italian buildings and the fact they like to lean, but these towers lean. Something about the south ground. Apparently there are 9 towers in Italy like this.I guess at least they are beig stabilized so it’s really more of a threat to themselves!
Finally we peeked in the Basilica di San Petronio and called it good for the city.
Oh as a last fact, Bologna is not the birthplace of Bolognese sauce. They do have a kind of meat ragu, but we were told definitely they were absolutely unrelated.
We’re in Bologna for two nights, but let me tell you about the night before when we got here.
Because of our packed day, it was already getting late.
Then Bologna is one of those restricted cities were the instructions for driving in are, to say the least, dicey. There are traffic zones everywhere that you are not allowed to drive in – even worse, they fine you and you don’t even know it till years later.
We didn’t want to run the risk so we tried our best to follow instructions as well as we could, be really instructions were wanting. This makes it look way simpler than it actually was.
What this map fails to show are just how narrow the streets are. It does show all the no go streets, but because of the fact that we were driving a ‘large’ SUV to fit all 4 of us and our luggage, just because a street wasn’t no go didn’t mean we could actually FIT down that street.
Nicholas was not having fun trying to figure out how to get places. Sometimes we’d be trying to fit down a street, when a car would come the opposite direction and then it was a stalemate. Who would try to reverse into a little crevice to allow the other to pass. Stress levels were high.
We follow the map until we get to a large city square, blocked by police. Oh great. We pull up to the police and notice they are blocking the way because there is a giant mob of people in the square, obviously celebrating something. I assume they must be here to celebrate my arrival, but nobody seems to agree with me. We try to tell the police where we are trying to get to – a hotel that should be nearby. They point directly ahead, towards the mob of people. “Really?” we think, “through this crowd?” – Nicholas starts to drive. We notice in the rear view mirror the police officer chasing after us. No, not through the crowd, ahead and to the right he corrects, down a dead end alley way that looks like it shouldn’t fit our car, that is also blocked off by people in chairs.
After narrowly escaping mowing down a celebrating crowd of locals, we find the hotel and thankfully pass the keys off to hotel staff who is able to drive the car to wherever it’s supposed to actually go. Phew.
We’re in an Art hotel, it seems neat.
But hold up — what exactly is happening outside? We decided to check it out.
It turns out it’s a festival or something for the church, and the local bishop is visiting with a procession and a whole big celebration. Stupid. I’m just going to pretend they actually are here for me.
After calling it an early night, we got up early for a packed road trip driving day.
Today, the goal was to get on the road in Rovererto where we could hit up the oldest coffee shop in the world. Bontadi Coffee Roasters was founded in 1790 and they have a whole coffee museum dedicated to it! We got in right before they were open, but they were kind enough to let us in.
After seeing the museum, of course we had to go get some coffee, so we wandered into the square to find some.
Then, because we had a packed schedule, it was onwards to Verona.
Verona is now in the Veneto region of Italy, and we could start to see the transition away from more German influences towards Roman and Italian. Verona is most famous for being the setting for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. There’s also a roman amphitheatre which I was eager to see, called the Verona Arena. Naturally, a question I had was what on earth is the difference between an arena, a colosseum, and an amphitheaters? I can’t say I really know, other than it seems like there is only one Colosseum — the one in Rome. Turns out the Verona Arena is older than the Colosseum, and was used as a practice ground. It was built in 30 AD and is one of the oldest structures remaining.
Since we were going to see the Colosseum later, we decided not to go in, but we did camp out across the Arena to enjoy some aperol spritzes.
After lunch, we went to look for La Casa di Giulietta, which is the home of Cappello family and the inspiration for Romeo and Juliet (hence Juliet’s balcony). It was pretty crowded and touristy so we didn’t spend so much time there, but had to see it.
