Tuesday, April 16, 2013 -- On Foot in Beautiful Bologna

Before setting out today, we spent (too much) time trying to figure out why some walking tours we’d downloaded to our MP3 players were not appearing in our playlists.  Tom figured out a work-around and we were on our way. 

We stopped in at the enormous Cathedral of St. Peter on the nearby Via Independenza and then walked to the nearby Piazza Maggiore to begin the recorded tour.  We especially enjoyed the beautiful courtyard of the Archiginnasio, the first building of Bologna’s university, the oldest in Europe.  The Archiginnasio is now the home of the municipal library, which was hosting an exhibit highlighting children’s picture books about families with same-sex parents.  There were quite a few American volumes on display and it was interesting to see that the groundbreaking title in this genre was published in 1989.

Our guided wander took us to the church of San Domenico, where St. Dominic’s tomb, embellished with reliefs and sculptures from a notable cohort of artists, including Pisano and Michelangelo, is the big draw.

Santo Stefano is actually a complex of several churches, a courtyard and cloister fronting on a quiet, triangular piazza formed by several porticoed streets. 

 From there, it was a short walk to the Due Torre, the only two remaining towers dating from the Middle Ages in a city that once had hundreds.  One of the towers, the Torre Garisenda, leans every bit as dramatically as its famous cousin in Pisa; the effect is especially perilous-looking because of the small space in a busy piazza in which this tower sits.

A quick tour around the church of San Giacomo Maggiore and then on to the beautiful fresco cycle illustrating the life of St. Cecelia in the small oratory that bears her name.

At that point, we decided to unplug.  We were in the University district again, and decided to grab  panini and join the crowds of students in Piazza Giuseppe Verdi enjoying lunch and conversation in the midday sun.  It was a relaxed scene, an ancient university, thriving in the 21^st century, with a student population obviously drawn from all over the world.  Do you suppose they know how lucky they are?

We spent the first part of the afternoon roughly following a written walking tour around the canals of Bologna.  We crossed through the streets of the old Jewish Ghetto and had some interesting views of the canals that are still visible from street level today, but ditched the walk when the canals went underground and showed no promise of coming back into view.  We do have some significant canal experiences in our very near future, so this was no big loss. 

Uncharacteristically for us, we took a late afternoon break back in our apartment and, after the pause that refreshed, we returned to the food shops and small markets that had so enticed us yesterday to pick up to-die-for Lasagne Bolognese and some other dinner provisions.

After our espresso, we walked over to Via Independenza and up to the Piazza Maggiore and the adjacent Piazza Nettuno for a last look at this gorgeous city, beautifully lit as the evening darkened.  Everything about Bologna works so well with everything else: porticoes, palazzi, churches, university, piazzas, beautifully turned-out citizens, food, beautiful shops, cafes spilling into the streets, real life surrounded by history.  It’s just magic, almost hard to believe it’s not a movie set.

Monday, April 15, 2013 -- Riomaggiore to Bologna

We’d been advised by our host that it was possible to drive our car into the tiny “downtown” before 10:00 so, rather than drag our gear uphill to the our garage. It was immeasurably easier for Tom to get the car out of the garage than it had been to back in it three days ago and he was able to drive it almost to our door.  This, however, turned out to be more blessing than curse.  As we were driving up the steep hill on our way out of town, we encountered a small school bus parked facing us.  Tom did not see the low wall on the passenger side of the car and we clipped it pretty much simultaneously with my warning shout.  The door and trim are pretty bent, the sliding door is scraped and the wind whistles through the gap between the window frame and the body of the car.  We don’t know the bottom line, but it surely won’t be pretty, but it could have been SO much worse.  Most importantly, no one was hurt, we hit a wall, not a car (Just imagining the bilingual hassle that would have been gives us chills!), and our car is perfectly functional, if not air tight!

So, off we went and we were soon breezing, a bit too speedily, up the Autostrada.  We were overtaken and flagged down by two lovely Italian policemen who inspected every document Tom could produce, advised him about speed limits and their meaning, and also about the requirement to have the headlights on, especially as we traveled through the many tunnels on our route.  They seemed especially interested in the visa stamps in Tom’s passport and the back side of his driver’s license; perhaps it was his status as an organ donor that impelled them to send us on our way with nothing but a few minutes’ delay of our progress. (After listening to their lesson on speed limits, I tried to keep my speed within the posted limit and found that everyone, including a Smart Car, was passing us. So much for that lesson.-Tom)

So, this morning could be the turning point that has us signing up for a bus tour to Niagara Falls, rather than planning the next “Mel and Tom on the Road” adventure…

Luckily, our stop in Parma held nothing but delights for us.  This lovely city has a largely pedestrianized Centro Storico, fine shops, an interesting duomo and accompanying baptistery clad in pink marble and another wonderful church, Santa Maria della Steccata, which was modeled on the original plan for St. Peter’s.  We enjoyed wandering around the city before heading back to the Autostrada. 

We made one more detour, to the small town of Marzabotto, just south of Bologna.  We visited an archeological area, but found it hard to make heads or tails out of the visible and the museum was, of course, closed for the requisite midday rest.

We found the parking garage closest to our apartment in Bologna, which is in the traffic-restricted Centro Storico, and walked the few blocks to our apartment on a narrow street lined with the porticoes that characterize the city.  Almost all the streets in the historic center are lined with covered arcades, known here as porticoes, and they are just lovely.  Many have frescoed ceilings, and all have graceful arches and, of course, protection from the weather, which we did not need on this gorgeous day.

After checking in to yet another winner of an apartment, we went for a walk to the central square, the Piazza Maggiore, stopped at the TI, visited the huge duomo, and just wandered the very high-end shopping streets, where some of the window displays of food are as enticing as the jewelry and leather goods nearby.

After happy hour at home, we walked to a restaurant that Tommaso, our friend from Martina Franca, had recommended.  En route, we walked through the university area, with many of the classroom buildings housed in old palazzi that line the porticoed streets.  There were students everywhere, with crowds of them sitting, talking, and just “being” in a large piazza. We were most certainly the only non-Italians at Trattoria da Vito, which was well off the tourist track and it was nice to be among the locals.  Mary Ellen’s roast rabbit was so good that Tom has begun to have designs on the many bunnies that seem to have overrun our neighborhood at home!

Sunday, April 14, 2013 -- Another Hike in the Cinque Terre

Today’s main event was the hike from the fifth and largest town, Monterosso, to Vernazza, the fourth town.  It was the one part of the coastal trail that we had not done when we were here before and, like yesterday’s trek from Vernazza to Corniglia, it was challenging, with lots of verticality.  Like the rest of the trail linking the towns, this portion is still officially closed as a result of landslides, but we’d talked to other hikers who said that it was passable.

Despite its difficulty, the trail offered many rewards.  The initial portion was a seemingly endless series of steep steps which took us up into the terraced vineyards that climb the hill.  We were able to see farmers at work on their vines and get an up-close sense of the challenges of producing a crop on such terrain.   It was interesting to see the funicular-like conveyer track used to transport the bins of grapes from the terraces down to collection points near the base of the hills.

 In many areas, the trail was on narrow ledges (without railings), where it was not possible to pass others coming from the opposite direction.  There were many hikers out on this warm and sunny day; we had trouble imagining how much difficult maneuvering is necessary during the height of the tourist season.  The hikers included families with young children, parents carrying babies, ladies in decidedly unsuitable footwear and lots of people with dogs.  On small group with a thirteen-year-old golden retriever had to literally carry the poor pup up the steps at some points!

Soon (OK, not really soon, but eventually) we were walking among the olive trees that produce the other main agricultural crop here.  Their shade was welcome and their silvery leaves brought the Italians’ use of olive branches on Palm Sunday back to mind.

In addition to the close-at-hand sights on the trail, the distant views were spectacular all the way.  The first were of Monterosso, its beaches, castle, and harbor, then the rocky coastline far below us, the tour boats, sail boats and kayaks on the turquoise sea, and finally, Vernazza came into view.  The trail’s vantage point has provided many a postcard photo of the small harbor, domed churches, warm-hued houses climbing the hills and spilling down to the seaside piazza and the tower above the far side of the bay.  We found an olive tree with two perfect “seats” and a picture perfect perch for our picnic and no five-star restaurant could have been better.

Back at sea level in Vernazza, we enjoyed a cold beer and a chance to just sit on the breakwater and enjoy the scene without having to move for a while.  We took the train back to Riomaggiore (via a stop in Manarola) for happy hour and dinner at home. 

On this mild evening, we went down to the harbor for our third sunset here and it was gorgeous one.  You could almost hear that big orange ball sizzle as it sank into the sea – wow! 

 

Saturday, April 13, 2012 -- The Cinque Terre

OK, we’ll start by saying that we do have to enter the Cinque Terre into our “Best Combination of God’s Handiwork and Man’s Modifications” competition. How could we have forgotten how extraordinarily beautiful these villages and their hillside settings are?!?

As we’re spending three nights here and there’s not much to do except drink in and hike through the scenery and explore the little towns strewn along the coast, we had a leisurely start to the day.  We spent (probably too much time) trying to recharge our Italian SIM cards online in the foolish belief that it would be more  efficient than other methods of doing it.  But, working at that task, even unsuccessfully, over yet another espresso in our own kitchen did not seem onerous at all.  In the event that our online efforts don’t work out, all the grocery stores and Tabacchi around sell recharge cards and we’ll do it that way.

At the Riomaggiore station, we bought two-day tickets that allow train travel among the villages, as well as access to local minibuses, several museums, and the national park trails.  As the trail from Riomaggiore to the next village, Manarola, was closed, we took the two-minute train ride there and wandered around a bit before moving on to Vernazza, the fourth of the five towns, going south to north.

Vernazza was the town most devastated by the October, 2011 landslides. It was inundated and buried in mud then but its recovery has been remarkable.  And, the tourists seem to know it – they (we) flocked off the train in droves to walk down the shop-lined main street that ends in a piazza at the small harbor.  We explored the old waterside church and some of the back lanes, including one that led to a lovely belvedere seemingly unknown to any but the locals.

We decided to see just how “closed” the closed trails were and decided to walk back from Vernazza (the fourth town) to Corniglia, the middle town.  We had a wonderful hike, which began with beautiful views down upon Vernazza’s harbor, tower, and church.  We met no barriers, so we continued hiking through areas of the trail that are obviously being reconstructed after the landslides of 2011.  We stopped to enjoy the ultimate lunch-with-a-view on our hike, which was a fairly challenging, frequently uphill trek.  All along the way, wildflowers seemed to be growing out of the rocks.  Wild iris, rosemary, the ubiquitous yellow flowers, cactus, century plants, and varieties unknown to us were everywhere along our way.   

The views were rewarding, especially as we neared Corniglia, our destination, and the only one of the five towns that does not get its feet wet in the sea.  It’s dramatically perched on a hilltop above the sea, so the approach is gorgeous and it has its own fabulous views over the water and to the other villages along the coast.  Entering the town from the trail, we walked along some of the thousands of miles of terraces that climb the hills in the Cinque Terre.  Vineyards and olive groves fill the terraces and a land that might seem unsuited for much yields great agricultural bounty.

After unwinding and cooling off with a beer at a small belvedere in Corniglia, we switch backed down close to 400 steps (some young children were keeping count) to the railroad station and caught a train to Manarola.  There we took a bus, hoping to visit an historic olive press WAY up the hill.  All was closed up when we arrived, however, so we found a trail, took it back to Manarola, then a train back to home base in Riomaggiore and happy hour before venturing out for dinner.

We had local seafood for dinner at Il Grottino, on Riomaggiore’s main drag.  The standout dish, and one that will likely be hard to forget, was cuttlefish and fennel, dressed in lots of olive oil.  We’ll be tasting it in memory for years!

(Mary Ellen insisted I put in a picture of myself so I am adding one of her. Forgive the wind for its effect on her hair. It had no effect on mine.-Tom)

Friday, April 12, 2013 -- Farewell Tuscany, Hello Cinque Terre

We checked out of our hilltop digs and bumped down the rutted dirt road one last time this morning under gray skies.  We were headed for the Tyrrhenian coast, but with some intermediary stops along the way. 

First up was Pistoia, a short drive northwest of Florence and pretty much off the tourist radar.  It has a lovely historic center, with the requisite cathedral, baptistery, campanile (this one a part of a former fortification) and any number of narrow lanes and other notable churches.  We also enjoyed a market of vendors from Sicily selling all manner of sweet and savory treats. 

Then it was on to revisit lovely Lucca.  This medieval gem is hard to pass up if we’re anywhere in its vicinity.  The original walls and fortifications of the city have been transformed into a lovely park.  A wide paved path is bordered by old trees, benches, playground equipment and picnic tables and is well used by locals and visitors alike.  The small Centro Storico is home to lovely piazzas, often focused on notable church facades, and the unusual Piazza Anfiteatro, whose buildings follow the curved lines of the Roman amphitheater once located there.

From Lucca, it was a short drive northwest to the coast, passing the marble quarries of Carrara en route.  Our destination was Riomaggiore, one of five small towns along the Italian Riviera that are part of a national park and collectively known as the Cinque Terre, five lands.  Riomaggiore is the southernmost of the five towns, which are linked by rail and hiking trails.  About 18 months ago, a landslide devastated parts of the Cinque Terre, especially the town of Vernazza and much of the trail linking the towns.  We still hope to be able to hike part of the route while we’re here.

Riomaggiore is perched on a steep hill, with houses clinging to the vertical face.  The drive into town was dramatic, and Tom’s efforts to maneuver the car into our parking garage space also claimed their share of suspense.  The small town has a short, steep main drag that ends in a small harbor and beach area.  On this sunny afternoon, the sea was raging, even inside the harbor, when we arrived for our first look this afternoon and again when we returned to watch the sun set into the sea.  The tranquility of the distant views contrasted greatly with the waves thundering over the rocks at our feet.  It was a lovely mild evening, all the more so because a quick grab saved Tom’s camera and tripod did from falling over a low wall and onto the rocks and harbor below.