Blogs from Verona, Veneto, Italy, Europe - page 15

We spent our second day in Venice not actually in Venice...we took a day trip to Verona. I don't know how I managed to do it but I talked Matt into seeing an opera! There's a beautiful Roman amphitheatre there built around 30 AD and is now used for opera performances...the Arena di Verona. It's the third largest amphitheatre in existance. They have an opera festival every summer and Saturday, September 1st was the last night of the festival. They were performing "Aida" which, beyond it being an opera, I knew nothing about, but I talked Matt into it. Tickets were about $30 a person for the nosebleed seats and you're giving a seat on the stone steps of the amphitheatre, so we got blow-up seat cushions to protect our tushes from the hard cold marble ... read more

so i consider myself fairly athletic, kind of fit, decent balance...not so much a bike rider though, i don't think i've ridden for maybe 10 years. but hey, there's free bikes in verona! marc practicaly learned to ride before he learned to walk and he's been itching to ride the entire trip. so i get on the bike, yeah, my balance is real shaky, throw in traffic and an unfamiliar city...there's a high likelihood of something disastrous happening. and don't foget about the packs...so marc puts on his pack, then my pack in front and navigates us through the city peeking over my pack. it has to be a bit comical seeing me riding with nothing and then marc ladden down with two huge packs, and yet he still rides in a straighter line than me. ... read more

So I finally decided to pack my bags and head over to the continent and do something different for my birthday. I visited a friend who lives in Verona, Italy. As you may know, I love all things Italian, art.....history.....culture.........FOOD......and it has always been a dream to one day end up living there. Did it live up to my expectations??? Absolutely and much more! Although there is so much more of the country to see. Getting off the plane and walking on the tarmac to get into the airport started the staring from men! You hear all the stories but it's quite funny when it actually happens. Upon arrving, my friend picked me up and took me straight into downtown Verona. WOW!!! It is so old and beautiful. So much history......which I love! The people ... read more

OK, so it looks like I really stink about updating my blog. Sorry. :( But since I've last blogged I went to Verona, Padua, and Venice! So I'll write about my adventrues there, starting now! So the school took us to Verona on Friday, November 10. Once again, we left the train station in Rome really early and everyone seemed to be annoyed by my unusual perkiness. Oh well! I can't help it--I get excited. We got there about noon. We ate lunch at a little cafeteria-style restaurant there, and it was pretty good. We all were ready to go to Castevecchio, but when we arrived there, it was closed down for a senator's meeting. Go figure. So with 23 anxious students, Emilio improvised with a trip to the Mantegna art exhibit there. It wasn't bad, ... read more

Quick Notes: 1. "Red Light Stupido"! Driving here is scary and we're only in Northern Italy. They say it gets worse the farther south you go. I'm thinking of leaving the car in a garage and taking the trains. 2. Life lesson - if you buy something for $7,000 and sell it a few weeks later for $250,000, something is probably wrong. (See below). 3. Italian men are like peacocks. They wear flashy colors, bright red shoes, and love to strut. ITALY! we love the pizza and the pasta and are getting fatter by the minute! We pulled into Verona in the late afternoon and went into town on the bus for dinner. the bus managed to foil us twice--both on the way there and on the way back. those tricky italians! we found a wine ... read more