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Published: September 18th 2011
We had two lucky breaks today. Traveling from Venice to Cinque Terre involved several changes of train, so when planning we had decided to stay overnight somewhere on the way to break up the travel. Parma was a small town on the way, so we decided to book accommodation, blessing in disguise. We had not been able to book online the train to La Spezia, so we decided before leaving the station to book the train for the following day. Whilst in the long line up, many people were indicating frustration at not being able to see on the boards what platform to go to for the La Spezia connection from Parma, due in only about 15 mins.
It seems there is a train strike today, so no train connections to La Spezia were going to come this afternoon. Many people were stranded and trying to work out how they could get across to La Spezia and Cinque Terre to their booked accommodation – no buses travel this route, so many people would have been looking for local accommodation.
Walking to the hotel, the town was deserted and not a single café, bar open, and at 3pm, we
were starving, as no lunch was available on the train and no time at our connecting stations.
We went looking for food, and could here this roar of drums, to find our second lucky break – the town was deserted because there was a festival on. Palio di Parma, and all of the locals were dressed in period dress and drummers and flag throwers entertaining the crowd. They were in a piazza with arched roof (disused castle?) so the noise of several bands of drummers reverberated magnificently.
The costumes were amazing and music and pageantry was very exciting to arrive just as this festival was underway. We were a part of a true local celebration of their history and culture.
It culminated with a parade through the town, and celebrations in the main piazza.
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