Bologna

Italy blog#3

Our next major hub that we based ourselves out of was Bologna. I'll admit my memories of Bologna are jaded by our train ride there... (to be fair, good stuff below the first paragraph)

Things were going quite smoothly, train was on time, our seats were in a good location. We got our suitcases off the train smoothly, found elevators and everything, and just as we were leaving the station, I realized our backpacks were still on the train. We were so worried about getting our suitcases off with their bulk and weight that we left them. Brie ran back to try to get them off the train, tripping on the stairs twice, and then she couldn't find it. We spent an hour in the customer service office trying to use Brie's French to describe our bags, and of course it was raining and our umbrellas were in the backpacks. My mind kept racing the entire time about what was missing. Luckily Brie remembered that she did have the hotel phone number so they finally called saying they were going to have both bags. Before we left they told us that they found one of the bags, mine, but they didn't find Brie's and it was right next to mine (we think they finally identified it by the New Zealand luggage tag on hers- thank goodness she had it on there). We decided to just take a taxi to our hotel after we got the initial paperwork done for our packs, and ate at Osteria Al Capella inside our hotel. The food was good, I had tortellini with butter and sage, Brie has lasagna, a local food. We had a local wine called pinoletto. The rest of our afternoon was spent not exploring Bologna as originally planned, but crashed our worrying in the hotel, we were notified that we could get our bags back at 5. Our bags ended up going to Rome without us. End of this story, we got our bags back in one piece and everything inside. Needless to say, taking trains after this one was especially stressful.

Our room at Al Capello Rosso

We stayed at Al Capella Rosso in Bologna, where the rooms were themed in some way or other. Ours was red with mirrors on one wall. This hotel had the best conditions for washing clothes in the sink and hanging them dry on the heated towel rack (score!). It was also the perfect temperature. Most of our time staying there we were going to surrounding cities. The first night we went to Ristorante da Nello (http://www.ristorantedanello.com/Home_Page.html) after visiting Bologna's quasi Christmas market. The restaurant was recommended by the hotel, and was obviously where the hotels sent English speaking tourists, but they let us practice bad Italian on them and the food was excellent. I wasn't feeling up for much, but I had onion soup and mashed potatoes and Brie had Mortadella and artichoke with cheese. We had Torcello wine, and had a Queen Charlotte cake slice for dessert. On our way back to the hotel, there was a protest for women's rights in the central plaza. When we got back to our hotel, we passed our from exhaustion.

Alley outside the hotel

Walking in the middle of the street can be so fun

Alley around the hotel

Our hotel left us chocolate and weather reports on our pillows

The last day we were in Bologna was a day planned to explore the city. We got up late, after a late night in Parma the previous evening, and meandered to the two towers at Piazza di Porta Ravegnana. One tower is much taller (called Asinelli) than the other (shorter one is called Garisenda), taller than the leaning tower of Pisa. Way back when there used to be 180 of said towers in Bologna, perhaps for  defensive purposes, but who knows, but less than 20 exist today. Garisenda was mentioned by Dante Alighieri twice in his works. Garisenda also leans quite substantially. Asinelli "is 97.20 m-high with a drop of 2.23 metres and an inner staircase of 498 steps completed in 1684." Garisenda is only 47 meters tall. Yes we climbed up 498 steps. Yes, I complained nearly the whole way up. Every 3 sets of staircases led to a platform, so it was difficult to tell how far up you truly were. Inside were markers telling you that this tower was taller than X,Y,Z. At the top city workers were stringing lights between the top and bottom of the tower, I would not like their job as gorgeous as the end result was. It was also cold as hell on top, and though the view was pretty, I was ready to get down, which was disorienting at best with sloped steps and staircases, that in some places were quite narrow. There are fewer times that I'm happy to have railings as when I'm climbing up and down some tower without modern staircases! To quote again Bologna's tourism bureau about the towers- 'The Asinelli Tower was built in 1109 - 19 by the Asinelli family, but by the following century it had already passed under the control of the Commune.The plinth is surrounded by a small 'stronghold' built in 1488 to house the soldiers of the watch. Today, its arcade is occupied by a few craft shops and ateliers, as a memento of the merchants' trade of the Medieval 'mercato di mezzo'. The Garisenda Tower, built around the same time, is much smaller (47 metres) with a steeper drop (3.22 m) due to an early and more marked subsidence of soil and foundation. Dante, who saw the tower before the process had started, compared it to a leaning Anteo in the 31st Canto of his Inferno. In mid 14th century the tower had to be lowered. The ashlar covering in selenite stone of the base dates back to the late 19th century.' (http://www.bolognawelcome.com/en/places-to-see/history-art/params/CategorieLuoghi_10/Luoghi_116/ref/Le%20due%20Torri%3A%20Garisenda%20e%20degli%20Asinelli).

The story is continued below the pictures!

The central square

The city Christmas tree!

The two towers

Halfway up the tower?

View from the top

Don't look down

Unenviable job of stringing lights

After climbing the tower we decided to walk to Complesso di Santo Stefano. You can read more about in it at the same website as the towers, but it had lovely frescoes inside. It also contained more than its share of reliquaries, which always manage to give me the creeps. Seriously people, dead body parts should remain with their original owners, not displayed in ornate glass things. EEEEEWWWWW..... enough said. The city of Bologna contains many old buildings dating back to the 1300s or so, so everywhere you turn it's another old famous building. We started to wander to the botanical gardens Giardini Margherita, but just as we finally reached them, we decided we were too hungry (we didn't have breakfast), and we figured if we were going to find somewhere to sit down at (since it was coooollllddd- the coldest day yet- hovering right at the point that you expect snow). We ended up finding the Trattoria da Gianni, where I had vegetarian lasagna with artichokes, and Brie had ragu with tagliatelle pasta. We had a San Giovese red wine with our lunch and for dessert I had Mascarpone with Ameretti and Brie had a cream gelato with balsamico. We then tried to find Ta Pielle, without luck, walked back to Via Indipenza and went to many many makeup shops, included- WJcon, Glossip, Kiko again, and Calzedonia for leggings- they really do make cuter ones here than in the US. We called it an early afternoon so we could pack and get ready for the evening.

Complesso di Santo Stefano

Motor bikes were everywhere!

The tower lit up at night

Leaning Garisenda tower

The hotel's front desk person was very friendly, but didn't speak too much English, and he didn't have very many recommendations of places to eat. When we asked for suggestions, he recommended the places we went on our first day there, and finally we got out of him La Taverna Di Roberto. I had pasta with pecorino cheese, Brie had tortellini al brodo, which is a broth soup with tortellini, Brie declares after this trip that our mother needs to step up her game on the al brodo. We split a bottle of Rebola Colli di Rimini white wine, which was dry, but not a super dry wine. I handle the whites better than reds, but one glass and I always have a 20 minute period of feeling a bit tipsy- yes I'm a light weight! After dinner we headed back for the night. The next morning consisted of getting breakfast, dropping my camera, and catching a train to Florence. In the next blog I'll talk about Ravenna, one of our day trips from Bologna.

Our last breakfast in Bologna

Tips:

• Do a bag check/count before leaving your hotel, and especially before stepping off the train.
• Leave an itinerary with your trip details including phone numbers and locations of hotels in each one of your bags.
• Put a luggage tag on everything!
• Know how to describe colors in the country you're going to.
• Don't ask for pasta with Bolognese sauce, it's not from there.
• Don't climb towers when it's very windy and cold, and especially not without your inhaler (dumb move).
• If you're going anywhere in Europe during the summer, reservations are required for lunch and dinner, winter you might be able to skate by. This is especially true for Saturday nights!
• Coperto= cover charge