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Published: June 18th 2017
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Bellaria Igea Marina
The sunflowers are blooming. Our two night stay south of Ravenna is over and today we are traveling to Padua. Our previous visits to the area were in 2001 on a bus tour with a day visit to Venice and in 2011 for a brief look at one of the churches in Padua. This time we are in the city for three nights so that we can really visit Venice and the islands of Murano and Burano.
We farewell our host family, say good luck to the son about to sit his final exam at high school, and load the car. Our first stop is a kilometre along the road for photos of sunflowers. We have left the olives behind and are now in the country of sunflowers and maize. We wonder about rice growing in the Po River area. There are also pockets of wheat.
Our journey will follow the coastline all the way to Padua. The area has many low lying fields surrounded by water. There are several ports along the way. We soon join the convoys of trucks heading in both directions. The speed limit is 90 kph but we struggle to get past 70. Just as a group of
Padua
Discovering the streets of Padua on our walking tour. trucks turn off they are replaced by another half a dozen or so. It is slow going. We stop briefly for a banana and a slurp of water at a layby. Soon we have a truck on our bumper. Getting goods in and out of Venice must be a real business.
Driving into Padua we thought we would recognize familiar sights, but no. Not even the shopping centre where we bought our valuable cabin bag six years ago. We thought a brief visit to show the bag where it had come from would be in order. However, we are approaching the city from a different direction. We wind our way into the centre of the city and find a handy carpark. Time for lunch and a quick walk around. We have not really come to Padua this time to see the sights. Back at the carpark we realize why we might not revisit. The parking fee was the most expensive of the trip so far. Perhaps it is to help pay the very helpful parking attendant.
Staying in Venice with a car is not really an option so we have chosen a hotel not far from Padua railway
Padua
Palazzo della Ragione
station. Checking into the hotel the receptionist is more than helpful with directions to the bus stop and options for our train journey. Catch the train that stops at all stations and takes 50 minutes. For the same price we can take the regional train and it takes 30 minutes. Or we could pay big money and catch the express train.
We have a quiet night in after a big lunch and plan for tomorrow. We decide that the trip to Venice will be a trip of exploration so that we will be fully prepared for our visit to Murano and Burano the following day. The forecast is for fine hot weather. As we prepare for bed the skies darken and there is a brief shower passing by. It has been very humid so hopefully this little bit of rain clears the air. The raincoats are still in the bag, somewhere.
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