We cheaped out and got 2nd class tickets for our train ride to Bologna. It's hard to not be frugal when every euro is $1.30 (it has dropped a bit since then I've heard). Before leaving Venice, I had looked up a couple hotels that had rooms available. I didn't make a reservation at any of them, we decided to wing it. Which is cool in theory, much harder in practice. I realized how essential a map is once we arrived in Bologna and we had no idea where the street that had the hotels actually was.
A bit of wandering and some sore shoulders later, we stumbled upon one of the hotels I had found. It looked impressive from the outside and when we walked in, we were even more impressed. Gold accents, completely white and plush reception area. It was swanky. I nearly asked the man to repeat himself when he told us the rate was only 89 Euro per night. Having just spend 210 Euro per night in Venice, I felt like I was saving a fortune! So we booked our room for a night at Tre Vecchi in Bologna off the main road.
Our room was equally impressive with gold accents, a large bathroom and a street view.
View from the window.
After settling in, we hopped on the (ever so slow) internets to find someplace for dinner. We arrived on a Sunday though and pretty much everything closes on Sundays in Europe. Inevitably, we consulted the front desk of our hotel. A very nice Russian woman who spoke very good Italian and English sent us to a cute little restaurant called Anna Maria. She said it was "not for tourist" and "authentic". We were hoping to find some authentic Bolognese sauce since it supposedly originated in Bologna. It wasn't quite time for dinner (remember, it's a late affair in Italy) so we set out to wander the street to grab a snack and check it all out.
We forgot out rule to "never stop at the first place" and stopped at the first trattoria we found. Damn it. It was run by a bunch of college kids. No true Italian roots in any of them. Fail. The sandwich wasn't too bad and then we sipped a couple espressos down (as is Italian custom, hah). Then off exploring we were.
Bologna was one of the most unique cities we visited. I would say perhaps as unique as Venice even. This is because its architecture was completely different. The architecture in Bologna was very renaissance. Or at least it seemed that way to me.
After working up an appetite, we found the restaurant recommended by the Russian-Italian lady. I ordered a pasta with Bolognese sauce and...I can't remember what Steven ordered. This place was alright, they made a mistake and forgot to bring me a salad or something but the service was generally good. The Bolognese sauce was super oily. I don't know if that's how it is traditionally made but to me I felt that the sauce was separating too much. It was tasty at least. The star of our meal was dessert though. I got a deliciously refreshing bowl of lemon gelato and Steven got a bowl of some innocent looking fruit salad. They must have sprinkled the fruit salad with fairy dust because it was amazing. When we were leaving Steven asked our server what the syrup was made out of. He tried not to answer, saying it was a secret but Steven persisted pushing that we'll be leaving for the US the next day! Guess what it was....
Orange Fanta! Wanna Fanta?! Yes. Yes I do. All over my fruit from now on.
It was pretty late by the time we staggered to the hotel. That was the last honest to goodness Italian dinner we had.
Monday we awoke with purpose and started putting the pieces together to get us to Lamborghini! You see, Steven's uncle has a friend who works there and he was going to get us a tour! His uncle was the one who suggested we go to Bologna and he actually recommended the hotel we were staying in (though we didn't realize that until after we checked in). He told us it was a quick trip to get to Lamborghini from Bologna. Uh...maybe if we drove a lamborghini. I was a train ride plus a bus/taxi ride away, or a 50 euro, 45 min taxi ride, one way. It wasn't feasible. What a shame, since it had always been our plan to visit Ferarri or Lamborghini and if we had gone to Modena like I had originally planned, we could have made it (Ferrari is a hop skip and a jump from Modena). Or if we had driven, that would have fixed it too.
With our original plans in shambles, we tried to make the best of it by shopping for all our family members that we had promised gifts too. At which point we realized another grave mistake. We had essentially waited until the last minute to shop and Bologna just couldn't deliver. That's not entirely true. If you wanted to fill your luggage with shoes, you'd be set. We did not.
We wandered around Bologna for the better of 5 hours looking and searching and going in circles. We were somewhat successful and got a few gifts and also saw some of the beautiful sites on our way.
This fountain was near the train station at one end of he main road. The structure was impressive and this fountain was suggestive. I think that horse has bad intentions.
Steven's attempt at long arming our photo here resulted in one of the funniest photos I've seen of him. We call this "Blue Steel". bahahaha So suave and debonaire.
This guy was on the other side of the park from the lady with the horse problem. He was by far the most clothed out of all the statues.
He was also covered in pigeons and this is why.
Someone was purposely feeding the stupid things. I should have punted one.
This statue was the most impressive. We read that when this was built, it caused quite a lot of turmoil. The native Bologna people were embarrassed about the uh...detail....and wanted the artists to add grape leaves to hide the man bits. Honestly, I thought the women with the water canons out their ta-tas was more offensive than a little wee-wee. But maybe that makes me an American prude? Who knows.
Still had to get our photo in front of it through.
Besides the water canon maidens, Bologna is infamous for it's two towers. Surprise, surprise, they're leaning. One is leaning quite a bit more than the other.
I guess the practice of geotechnical engineering wasn't really big back then.
We had train reservations for 8pm that night but were fed up with wandering around aimlessly by 4. We caught a taxi and got the next train to Milano Centrale.
We were exhausted. Both physically, mentally and emotionally. Bologna had been such a burden and kind of a disappointment. We were ready to go home. We were ready to hear nothing but English. We were spent.
However, we were not cut a break. There we were, sitting in first class, minding our own business, I was even sleeping a little. When all of a sudden a woke up to Steven saying something in Italian to a women standing by our seats. She didn't speak much Italian, just kept on saying "food" and motioning to her stomach and mouth. We tried every which way to tell her we didn't have any food (kind of a lie) and to get her to leave. But she just stood there, expectantly. We had experienced our fair share of beggars in town and had gotten most of them to go away with a simple, no. (except for this one guy in Bologna that started motioning to my bag which was sitting on the ground by my feet. This made us uncomfortable and kinda pissed. So the next time we said no, we made sure he knew we meant business...and then he left). But this lady wouldn't budge. We said in "mostly" clear Italian, "No we don't have any food" but she just stood there with this half grin on her face and waited. Finally Steven used the Italian word that means everything "Prego" and that did the trick...how...I'm not sure...but she still walked away. After that little episode, I was really done.
We stepped on the connecting train to Malpense and sat, halfway glad it was almost over, and halfway sad that we were leaving. We knew the Hawns were heading back the same day and not 15 mins after Steven had said "Wouldn't it be funny if the Hawns just showed up" I saw Matt and Jess and their luggage walking by the window. Oh what a sight for sore eyes.
We shared our stories or woe and success as we traveled the last 45 mins to the airport.
All four of us stayed in First Hotel that had a shuttle service to and from the airport. It took us a bit to find the shuttle when we arrived but checking in was a breeze and the luggage service was nice. From our experience in Trinidad, we knew it was important to check in online. In doing so, I realize yet another grave mistake. I had accidentally bought our tickets under Elizabeth DiNatale and Steven George. However my loverly husband's passport has his full name of Steven George, JR. Oops. I couldn't check him in online because his names didn't match perfectly. Crap. Mini-panic attack. There goes our easy flight in the mornin.
We tried to put that behind us and enjoy a dinner with the Hawns at the hotels "Italian" restaurant. It was about as Italian as an Olive Garden. And it was still in Italy, so you can imagine how bad it performed.
There's no rest of the weary at First Hotel in Milan. The bed was as stiff as plywood with a cement base. The morning could not come soon enough.
I'm sorry this is so long, but I swear I'm wrapping this saga up in 5 posts!
Check in wasn't so bad. We had to prove that Steven's pack was within carry-on spec (thank god it was, because we could have sworn it wasn't). When we went through security though, our world came crumbling down.....they made us leave the olive oil. When we were in Cinque Terre, we bought a small can of olive oil and a small jar of Pesto sauce. In Bologna we bought a small jar of Bolognese sauce. They let us keep the sauces....but they took the olive oil.....Beautiful, native olive oil. My heart aches to know it's in an Italian landfill now. What a waste, both in the sense of lost possibilities and excess garbage.
If you learn nothing from this blog at least take my advice and check in online the day before your flight. Doing this will give you a priority seating zone and you'll be able to take your torture...I mean seat...earlier than others. This is a small but valuable victory.
On the plane, everything seemed great. Until we took off 45 mins late. The curse...it returns.
We lost even more time in the air. We didn't have a big layover to burn anyways. We. Were. Screwed.
We landed with 35 mins till our next flight took off (not boarded...took off). We were met at the jetway by a nice guy in a bright orange vest that handed us tickets that said "express connection" and told us to run. I...hate running with a backpack. I refused to do it school...and then my bag was small. I ran for a bit but was being smacked in the back of my head with my pack and flat up stopped running (like an ornery mule). I didn't realize the gravity of the situation then it was explained to me that we had to go OUT of security to get through customs (US customs...in N...woo...) and then back through security to even get to our gate. Feck. I started running then. We barely made it. We were the last on the plane and it left the gate about 5 mins after we sat down. Side rant: When we returned from Trinidad into Miami, we were greeted with smiles and warm welcomes of "Welcome home" and some such nonsense. In NY (and it hurts me to admit this b/c I'm from NY and I constantly defend my home state), we were greeted by a man who obviously had the biggest case of hemorrhoids. There's no other reason he would be so grumpy. Then after that guy, we were rushed to his buddy who apparently had a wedgie b/c he was grumpy too.
Landing in Raleigh was a sweet relief. We were a 20 min drive from our pups and beer (sweet hoppy sustenance).
This concluded out FIRST (of many?!) trips to Italy. Our goal is to see the country by sections. This trip was all the north (though we may have to return to the north to visit the lakes) and the next trip will be the central part and then the south and then Sicily...where we hope to find our rich relatives.
It was an experience I'd never want to trade. I learned a lot and experienced a lot. It was awesome.
Things we learned in Italy (some of this might be repeated from previous lists):
- All Italians wear jeans and sneakers. The blogs are wrong.
- Prego means EVERYTHING. When in doubt, say Prego.
- Italians say Ciao, they hardly ever say Salve, the blogs are wrong again.
- Don't speak Spanish to Italians...they don't like that.
- Baccala' is gross.
- Go to Verona, eat at Marie Callas. Tell Laura we said "Hi!"
- Venice is like an Italian Disney World Cruise.
- B&B's in Venice are not always as they appear.
- In Venice, leave Dorsoduro, San Marco and the Rialto, get lost in Venetian neighborhoods (look for laundry).
- Venice smells awful. It's better in the rain.
- Punt a Pigeon. They're everywhere.
- Don't waste money on valperotto (water bus) passes. Walk.
- Take a bottle of wine on a Gondola. Grab other tourists, it's cheaper.
- Drink water, eat yogurt, don't get sick.
- Learn some Italian.
- Make sure you buy international plane tickets under the name listed on ones passport.
- Drive. It is freeing.
- Buy first class train tickets.
- Bring euros with you from the US.
- Look like a tourist or you'll miss things.
- 4 out of 5 dogs in Italy are Border Collies. We'd fit right in. :-)
- Don't spend more than a day and a half in Venice.
- Either plan for a long trip or plan to return.
Liz
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