Blogs from Emilia-Romagna, Italy, Europe - page 11

After a long travel from Lithuania, finally we reached Italy. My purpose was to visit Rimini. Rimini is a really artistic city with ancient Roman and Renaissanse monuments, this city is the hometown for well-known film director Federico Fellini. When I arrived in this city, I noticed, what it's is really vibrant. A lot of people, lights and sounds. The city itself is really diverse, because in daytime Rimini is peaceful and silent place, but at night Rimini shows the other side. In the daytime I enjoy the spellbinding view of Rimini. Firsly, I visit Malatesta Temple. It was built in around 1450, by Leon Battista Alberti. I really interested in Romanesque style, so it was nice to visit one more building built in this style. Another object I visited was The Arch of Augustus. It ... read more

Our next campsite was high up in the hills between Bologna and Florence. There was nothing around it only hills. We had a large spot with lovely views. We asked about travelling in to Bologna, which we had passed through but never really visited. We were advised that the best way was by train. However, the time to drive to the train was 40 minutes! Off we set for the 11.05 down narrow twisty roads and up and down dale, eventually arriving after 40 minutes as advised. The train was good though and deposited us 10 minutes walk from the centre of town. Bologna is a nice city with lots of nice buildings. In fact everything was nice but nothing great. The highlight was probably the Anatomical University and the 16th century lecture room all in ... read more

Day 17, Thursday, May 29 See the pictures from the previous blog, Jim jumped the gun on posting the pictures from our day, he was on a meat and cheese high! This is our first full day in the area and it has been reserved for a full-day food tour to see how Parmesan cheese, prosciutto, and balsamic vinegar is made. The email we had received advised us to meet our personal guide at a restaurant just off the Autostrada in Parma but the instructions were not very clear so we left a little early just in case. There are three exits for Parma and our instructions were to exit off the Autostrada in Parma and look for a particular restaurant and wait in the parking lot for our guide. We decided to split the different ... read more

Day 15, Tuesday, May 27 The weather was not the best but we decided to take a drive north to the Chianti wine region. Again our friendly GPS took us on some back roads but eventually we found the Autostrada that took us to an exit to Greve in Chianti, a small town Jim read about that is in the heart of Chianti. Once again we found ourselves on tiny country roads that meandered through small hill towns with roads just big enough for one car to squeeze through which made Lisa very nervous. In addition it rained on and off, sometimes heavy. About an hour after leaving the farm we arrived in Greve in Chianti, parked the car and found a small trattoria to have lunch. Since it was a little cold the outdoor seating ... read more

We have our car back. I glanced out the window last night to see it driving into the hotel parking lot so Mel ran down to meet the driver and get the keys. The hire car goes back tomorrow morning so all is well again. Having seen the amazing mosaics in the Basilica yesterday, we did a bit of research. Ravenna has 8 UNESCO World Heritage sites in the city. They are all either basilicas or mausoleums from the 5th and 6th centuries and they are famous for their mosaics. We had not heard of the place but we wanted to see more of these amazing artworks. It is only a fairly small town so a walking tour to encompass all the major sights is the best bet. Central Ravenna is also a ‘ZTL’, which means ... read more