9:20am: Sitting on the train to Bologna. These Eurostar/AltaVelocita trains are so nice. Plugs, comfy seats, lots of leg room. So much better than flying. Of course, at 19 euros for a 1 hour ride, not exactly cheap either.
Woke up around 7:30, took a shower, paid (with credit card!), ate breakfast, and set off for the station at 8:30ish. Claudio said it was best to walk, but when I saw the taxi station in the Piazza…I had to. It was only 6 euros, worth every penny to save my legs, feet, and shoulders (from my backpack). Got my ticket with the self-serve machine with no problem and the train arrived shortly from Rome. The seat next to me is empty, so I have lots of room. Now just waiting for the train to leave, which I think it is finally doing a few minutes late.
Off to Bologna to eat myself sick for 3 days (and in the meantime to hopefully enjoy a bit of scenery along the way)!!!!
11:00am: in the hotel, all settled in and wireless set up easily. Cute little room, though a bit warm. Should be fine at night and I can always crack a window open. Train ride was nice when we weren't in a tunnel. Another glorious day in Italy.
Off to eat (and maybe sightsee a little)!
6:45pm: Phew, long tiring day. At 11, I set out to Piazza Maggiore, the main square in Bologna. Bologna is unique because it's lined with hundreds of miles of arcaded porticoes. Handy if it rains - which it did not today. But this means if it's busy, it feels very packed. And today was a VERY BUSY SATURDAY. It's less than 10 min walk from my hotel to the main area. I set out to find the daily food market, and what a lot of great looking food indeed. Unlike other markets like in Rome where people set up stalls in a square, these are permanent shops that set up things outside their shops. There are also lots of delis, meat, and fish shops interspersed. Wandered around and mostly just looked. The medieval streets are narrow, and busy, so it was kind of a mob scene. Pretty cool for sure though.
Got real hungry around noon and wandered around a lot to find a place that looked decent and not overly touristy. At about 1, I finally found a place called Scalinatella that had a large menu of pizzas and pastas very reasonably priced that didn't seem too touristy. Indeed, I heard no English being spoken inside (I got back to the hotel and while looking for something else I happened to find the name with the information that it is supposed to have some of the best pizza in Bologna…so I might just have to go back!!!)! Anyway I had pasta called "garganelli" - which I'd never heard of before but I've seen it on many menus since - and it was fresh and al dente and delicious with tons of grated cheese. I couldn't even finish it and just now at 7pm I am just starting to get hungry.
Anyway, after lunch, I wandered around the Piazza Maggiore area a bit more - it's lots of shopping so there were lots of locals out and about shopping on their Saturday afternoon. I forgot sunglasses so I've been trying, unsuccessfully, to find a pair of cheap ones. Then I sat in the square for a while and rested my feet until my museum walking tour at 3:30. Met up with the tour guide at the tourist info center, and there was a group of 4 Spaniards supposed to take the tour two… except that they left once they found out it was a museum, not a monument tour (that's tomorrow morning). So it was just me and the guide - like a free private tour of 4 museums! There was the archaeological museum, a museum for the city's art collection in the municipal building, a museum for the 20th Century painter Morandi (zzzz), and a civic medieval museum with artifacts from the city's great university history. 4 museums in just over 90 minutes, this is my kind of sight-seeing! The tour guide was great and refused to take a tip. I felt bad. We were talking about Italian coffee and why it's so good, and she said she had never heard of Starbucks!!!!!!!!!!!!! Amazing (in a good way). I tried to offer her a tip but she refused. So I basically got a private tour of 4 museums completely for free. I have a feeling tomorrow's tour will have more people, but I kind of hope not.
Got back to my hotel around 5:30 and soaked my feet in the bidet for a while, which I don't think helped that much, and researched some places for dinner. Turns out there might be a couple really great places right near my hotel so I will check one of those out.
10:00pm: Tried to go to Trattoria dal Biassanot shortly after 7pm (early by Italian standards), which came highly recommended by my hotel. Only 3 tables were full but he said every other place was reserved…that's the first time I've been turned away from a restaurant in Italy, in October no less! Looked like plenty of other people were being turned away too. Saw another recommended place across the street, and it looks good, but it's one of the few places opened Sunday so I wanted to save it. Walked down a bit and saw Trattoria Tony, which I had read about as being good. The menus for all these places were actually quite similar. Most of the tables at Tony had "reserved" signs, but they seated me. Very cute place, really nice waiters who kept playing with a few kids. By 8pm it was packed. I had a mixed salad (was actually craving vegetables) and the famous tortellini in brodo, which at 9 euros I find quite expensive for basically soup, but considering the pasta's handmade and expensive to buy or make I guess, it's not that bad. I saw it on other menus for as high as 14 euros… FOR A BOWL OF SOUP. Anyway, it was good. Nice meal in a very locals-y kind of place. Several of the people coming in who had reservations knew the owner/manager and gave him a big hug.
Asked my hotel if there was a decent pasticceria around since it was a bit chilly and she pointed me to one around the corner. I got a chocolate sandwich cookie type thing, which was deeeeeeeelicious. They had little mini cake like things which I may have to go back and try before I leave.
Came back here around 9 and did a bit of laundry. So the bathroom has a step in it and I've already tripped about 10 times. I know it will happen at least 20 more. Hopefully I make it out without actually hurting myself. The only English channel I get here is CNN. I've only had it on for a little while and I've almost thrown the remote at the TV multiple times.
So I started uploading my pictures from yesterday a few HOURS ago, and it's still only 75% done. The wireless here is incredibly slow, I guess. And that doesn’t include the few videos I took. I've got today's pictures all ready to go and I will put it all up as soon as possible, or rather, as soon as this connection cooperates...
Oh, one thing I almost forgot. To the pregnant woman who walked past me puffing on a cigarette…really? In 2009???????
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