Verona is a beautiful city just that is just more than an hour’s train ride from Venice. It is famous for a couple of things that we were interested in – The beautiful ancient Verona Arena that was a build by the Romans – and the house of Juliet (Romeo and Juliet) and her famous balcony.
When planning our visit to Venice, we realized that the Verona Opera Festival was being held in the arena at the same time we were there. What a great place to take in an Opera! We got tickets to see Carmen. Fortunately we booked a hotel room for the night in Verona as it turned out to be a very late night.
On our way we stopped in Padova to visit Anne’s cousin Zoe and her husband Alessandro and son Ryan.
Zoe took us on a little walking tour of Padova before lunch. We stopped in at the University of Padova which is the oldest university in Europe – established in 1222. One claim to fame is the fact that this university was the first place in the world to perform autopsies on humans. The school was built over a river and they would simply dump the bodies in the river below after they had worked on them.
After the little tour and the spritz we drove to a beautiful restaurant called Villa Salom – the place that Zoe and Alessandro got married several years ago. This old villa – now a restaurant was famous for ham – many different kinds of ham.
Delicious!
Thanks so much for a wonderful day Zoe, Alessandro and Ryan!
After our lunch we boarded another train to continue on to Verona. We checked into our hotel room and got ready for the opera – Anne doesn’t like to be late :). As it turned out we were very early.
We thought it was to start at 8pm. We soon realized it was to start at 8:45 – no problem we can wait. At 8:45 there was an announcement that the Stage Hands just went on strike – for an hour. They say this is common in Italy. No problem – we can wait. They kept the bar open :). The Opera was certainly worth the wait!
Beautiful marble street
We had a fantastic time at the Opera. The next morning we visited the home of Juliet to get a look at the famous balcony.
Verona and Padova are beautiful little towns. Definitely worth the visit!
Looks like an amazing place to visit!
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The architecture and old buildings are beautiful. Looks like the weather is as welcoming as each location you are visiting?
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Beautiful as we recall our visit to Verona many years ago , also Venice ; we are reliving Italy through your eyes and photos . Enjoy !
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