Padua, Vicenza and Verona

After our 3 days in Venice, we have spent a few days in each of three northern Italian cities —  Padua, Vicenza and Verona. Although they are quite close to each other they are surprisingly different. The main obstacle to our full enjoyment has been the searing heat. The whole region, and apparently much of the rest of Europe is having an exceptionally early and intense heatwave, with daily highs of 95 - 102 F (35 - 39 C), and occasional thunderstorms. We have been undeterred, fortified with plentiful cold water and daily indulgence in gelato.

We have been staying in various small comfortable B&B’s — a “residenzia”, an “Elite BB”, a “relais”, and an “Albergo” — all with excellent breakfast, comfortable rooms (with good air conditioning) and friendly landladies with a range of English skills. It was quite noticeable that once we were out of Venice, the locals were much more reluctant to try their English and we struggled with rusty and never very good Italian.

Italy is much changed from what we remember from trips here as children in the 1960s. Tap water is safe to drink, and excellent; hotels and restaurants are air-conditioned; cities are quiet with far fewer cars and honking horns; few people are smoking in the streets and the streets are immaculately clean, with battery-powered cleaning machines vacuuming and brushing any trash or dust.

Padua has a very old university founded in 1222 — Galileo taught there. Even though it is summer, there were many young people on bicycles and many inexpensive eateries. The city streets are small and there are few cars. We really liked the shaded arcades over the sidewalks wherever we walked. Padua is a big pilgrimage site with the Basilica of St Anthony of Padua as the main attraction. He is one of the most popular Catholic saints — he is asked for help finding lost things. The locals just call him “Santo” — he is the only one that counts. His feast day was June 13, so we just missed it, though there were still large crowds queuing up to visit his tomb, and people leaving white flowers at his statue. His enormous basilica dominates the south part of the town. 

One other site, not to be missed, but that we had never heard of, is the Chapel of the Scrovegni. This is a small chapel that allows only 25 people to visit for only 15 minutes at a time. Before entering, the select 25 must sit in a small sealed chamber for 15 minutes while the air is purified and dehumidified. All this is essential to protect the wonderful Giotto frescoes, painted in 1305. The interior of the chapel forms a picture book of the story of Jesus, with each of the 38 panels depicting a scene from the story — vital in an era when few could read. There were some other interesting touches; small medallions of the 7 deadly sins on one side of the aisle with their corresponding virtues on the other. It is amazing that the Chapel ever survived. Apparently the whole place was nearly “deconstructed” and the frescoes shipped off to the British Museum in the 19th century (like the Parthenon marbles!)

On a more secular note, it is so interesting to see that each of the towns we have visited has at least one street that is lined by the most exclusive and expensive shops selling beautifully designed and displayed men’s suits, women’s clothing, gloves, shoes and other high end items. Italians have a great sense of style…

Two other Padua notes: It is the home of Aperol, the ubiquitous orange aperitif that is served as an Aperol spritz in every cafe. It is also the city where Shakespeare set “The Taming of the Shrew”. He loved these north Italian towns!

Vicenza was our next destination — only 25 minutes by train from Padua, but a totally different ambience. It is the birthplace and main workplace of Palladio, the Renaissance architect who defined the neoclassical style that spread throughout Europe. It seemed like every building in the town was designed by Palladio and his acolytes and they give the town a very stately look and feel. We spent the first day walking around, always looking up at pillars, windows and cornices. We visited several interesting galleries housed in Palladian palazzos, including a really interesting architecture museum (We never thought we would write those words).

Unfortunately, we discovered that most of the buildings in the town we might have wanted to visit were closed on Mondays,  so despite the heat, we walked over 6 miles out of town to visit an interesting villa, gardens and a chapel. The Villa Valmarana was a beautiful building “with dwarves” (ai nani), again in Palladian style and with murals in every room painted by Tiepolo, and in beautiful condition. The dwarves are 17 fascinating stone statues set on the wall surrounding the villa. Tiepolo and his son also painted many imaginative and stylish frescoes in other buildings in the villa complex, which we enjoyed looking at and finding interesting little details. The villa had a lovely, but very steep garden, with a variety of trees, colorful flowers, herbs and beautiful views over the valley.

Our next stop was the chapel on Monte Berico, high above the city and accessed via a long, steep arched portico. The chapel was not much to look at, but the views of the city were wonderful. With the city below, we could see the southern edge of the Alps in the distance and the lush northern Italian plain stretching east towards Venice and west towards Verona.

During our walk we had come across the central square of Vicenza being prepared for a huge “Viva Verdi” concert. We discovered admission was free but you had to send an email to the city administration asking for tickets. Google Translate to the rescue; and a few minutes later we had a very charming and personal response saying that there were no tickets available but if we just turn up there would be space. Then we found that the restaurant we were planning to eat at was right on the square, and they had a table that gave us front-row seats, and we listened to the orchestra and singers warming up. So we had a delightful meal to the sounds of Verdi, then a fascinating glimpse of the parade of locals kitted out in elaborate and glamorous evening dress and spike heels arriving for the concert. After some technical issues the concert got started a bit late. The weather was looking threatening but we heard some fine choruses, solos and orchestral pieces, before the wind rose, rain came down, and giant cafe umbrellas were blowing over, scattering glassware. The audience started to scatter too, as did we, and we got back to our hotel just before the heavens opened, with thunder and lightning. It was dramatic, and we felt sorry that the weather spoiled the huge effort staged by the city, but we did experience some lovely music. 

Then, the next morning…on to Verona. The immediate impression was a bigger city;  busier, more tourists, more traffic, more to catch the eye in every direction. Shakespeare definitely contributed to the atmosphere, with “Romeo and Juliet” and “Two Gentlemen of Verona”. We are strenuously avoiding the “Juliet Balcony”, which apparently was only added to the house in the 1800’s, but is a serious revenue generator for the city. The huge Roman arena is the venue for the Verona Opera Festival, which has just started and features all the Italian favorites. The area round the arena was full of enormous pieces of scenery, including an elephant (for “Aida”) and a Moulin Rouge (for “La Boheme”) We considered going to a performance of Aida on Thursday, but it won’t start until 9:30 PM, runs for over 3 hours and we have an early start on Friday to catch our plane from Milan to Philadelphia — too bad.

We spent our first morning in Verona visiting some interesting churches — some built on top of older churches, the very oldest being 4th century Roman constructions. Several notable local saints were martyrs, killed by the Romans before the Romans converted to Christianity. Saint Fermo was killed in 304 with a “fishbone” and there are a couple of large fishbone “sculptures” in Verona to commemorate. A very early subterranean Romanesque church dedicated to St Fermo was a cool and fascinating place to visit with fine ancient frescoes and quiet simplicity. On top of the old church, a “new” church was built in the 13th century. It has a huge impressive wooden ceiling, like an upturned boat, with images of 416 saints, mostly unidentified. 

Other destinations included Sant’Anastasia and The Duomo of Verona, and in the afternoon a visit to a museum of Roman inscriptions. A Veronese nobleman, the Marquis Maffei, was obsessive about collecting stones with Greek and Roman inscriptions — it was part of the ethos of the Renaissance. He also collected stones with forged Latin inscriptions to expose the 16th century trade in fakes! Our final stop of the day was a huge and ancient red-brick fortress, on the banks of the fast-flowing Adige river, and now housing an amazing collection of ancient, mostly religious art.

Today is our last day in Verona and tomorrow we fly to Philadelphia from Milan. We have squeezed in a few more tourist destinations — a fine classical-style garden and a modern art galley, more as a respite from the heat than for a genuine love of the art. This afternoon — our last art gallery; the Palazzo Maffei, and one of the best collections and layouts we have ever seen. A spiral staircase led up to the roof with terrific views of Verona to end our wanderings. Tomorrow an early train to Milan.

Here are a few pictures, again in reverse order :-(  

Giusti Garden, Verona

Cathedral Cloister, with robot lawnmower, Verona

San Fermo Church wooden ceiling, Verona

Dante statue, Verona

Concert with rain clouds, Vicenza

Gelato, Vicenza

Arcade to chapel, Vicenza

Dwarves statues, Vicenza

Villa Valmarana “AI Nani”, Vicenza

Train from Padua to Vicenza

Giotto “Justice” Scrovegni Chapel, Padua

St Anthony of Padua Basilica

Central Market, Padua

 

Italy In June

After a wonderful week in Corfu with 15 members of our family, Lin and I took a ferry from Corfu to Igoumenitsa on the Greek mainland then a 20 hour voyage on an Italian ferry from Greece to Ancona on the Adriatic coast of Italy. The ferry was quite new and comfortable — we had a cabin with a shower. Most of the other passengers were truck drivers…all tough looking guys from Bulgaria, Serbia, Germany, Poland, etc., who slept on the benches in the ship’s bar. 

Ancona, itself, is primarily a port though it has a few interesting corners. It was very seriously damaged during WWII by American bombing, as it was an important port when Italy was occupied by the Germans. Our hotel had obviously been THE place to stay — the Grand Hotel Palace — with 20 foot ceilings and elaborate plaster cornices. It was wonderfully comfortable and after wandering round looking at a few interesting churches, we stopped at a nice little restaurant in the main square for dinner. We were entertained by the owner “attacking” the marauding pigeons with a high powered water pistol. After a quiet, non-rocking and rolling night, we enjoyed a delicious breakfast buffet where we bumped into a group of young American women working in Ancona this summer; one of them had gone to the same high school in Dublin, Ohio as grandchildren Leah and Evan.

Our next step was northwards on wonderful Italian high-speed trains to Venice. We sped at 120 mph through coastal towns, some of which I remember visiting in 1962 when my mother and 4 children including me visited Italy in a Fiat 500 Giardinera. We were so impressed by the immaculate farms and towns of the Po Valley, and we even crossed the Rubicon (though going in the opposite direction to Julius Caesar).

WOW! Venice is a completely weird and crazy city, different from anything we have ever seen — water everywhere and no cars. Directly from the station, we struggled with waterbus timetables, balky ticket machines and nervous tourists, but eventually found the right waterbus to the right “busstop” and then walked dragging our suitcases over hump-backed bridges to a charming little B&B for the next three nights. 

So much has been written about Venice that there is little more to say. It is a crazy patchwork of tiny streets, alleys, passageways and bridges, interlaced with canals of many sizes. The buildings go from vast grand palaces to tiny houses squeezed into oddly shaped gaps. Some are immaculately maintained, others are so dilapidated it is surprising they are still standing. There are virtually no straight lines. We were pleasantly surprised, after hearing horror stories, to find that the streets were relatively quiet and free of visitors. Even St Mark’s Square — the focus of much tourist activity — was almost empty. Our first evening we spent wandering round, dazed by the sights and sounds, and being regaled by gondoliers hoping for our custom. Their beautiful sleek black and elaborately decorated boats were everywhere.

With so much to see, what to do? We discovered almost by accident that the Venice Biennale of Art is taking place this summer so every church, palace and public space was given over to art exhibits. There are also two huge venues in the southeast of the city where the major exhibits are located. Our first day we visited the Peggy Guggenheim Museum (remarkable private collection of early 20th century art, and a lovely garden), a serendipitously discovered and fascinating exhibition on the history of maps (sponsored by Saudi Arabia!) in an old convent, and the mindbogglingly enormous Doges’ Palace, with the biggest oil paintings anyone has ever seen, mostly extolling the virtues of various Doges, who seemed to be portrayed as only slightly less important than Jesus and the saints. We were also amused by the “complaints letterbox” where ordinary citizens could post anonymous complaints about the behaviour of Venetian officials.

As we left the Doges’ Palace in the evening there was something going on with large numbers of police holding back the crowds to keep us away from some VIPs in expensive suits waking through the St Mark’s Square. Later at dinner on a small canal, our restaurant was occupied by 25 riot police, with helmets and shields who all seemed to be enjoying a nice Venetian meal. Apparently the mayor of Venice needs a huge protective force wherever he goes. He is so unpopular because he has introduced a “tourist fee” of 5 Euros a day for everyone who visits Venice on Friday to Monday and it is making it more difficult for locals to make a living as fewer tourists are visiting. 

The next day, we decided to go for it, and visit the Venice Biennale in the old Venice Arsenal. This turned into an experience of sensory overload — an enormous dark warehouse with massive colorful and cryptic modern artworks in every imaginable medium. We wandered for hours trying to make sense of it all. The artists, from all over the world, but particularly from Africa, SE Asia and South America had provided descriptions of their intent and motivations, but frankly their explanations often left us even more baffled. We probably need to abandon our western, rationalist, logical mental habits to get on the right wavelength, or perhaps no wavelength at all. 

After we had visited the central exhibit, it was on to somewhat smaller installations sponsored by various countries. We also moved to the other main site, where the Biennale has been held for more than a century.

Some of the country exhibits were playful and fun. We were particularly amused by the Japanese pavilion that was overrun by hundreds of well dressed baby dolls in sunglasses. Visitors were encouraged to walk around the exhibit holding a “baby” and doing various babycare activities, like feeding and changing. There were precocious babies playing on the roof, climbing ropes and watching TV. It all had something to do with the falling birth rate in Japan.

The American Pavilion was quite baffling. An artist called Alma Allen had created about 30 amorphous sculptures in various materials; all were called “untitled” and there was no artist’s statement. Not sure what that says about the USA!

A Belgian artist had collected over 50,000 postcards from junk shops and thrift shops and classified them into various themes by subject, color, type, country and pasted them on walls in columns 40 postcards high. We stared for ages from close up and from a distance. It was like a treasure hunt crossed with a pointillist painting.

After 6+ hours we staggered back to our hotel, exhausted and slept like logs that night.

Today we are in Padua, reached after a short train ride from Venice. On the waterbus from our hotel to the station we met someone who used to live in Narberth and when to school at Lower Merion High School, where Rob and Mark went. He was somewhat younger than them, though, traveling with wife, 3 very young kids and mother-in-law.

What a contrast Padua is… a quiet old town with many nice squares and old cobbled streets. As we walked down one little street we heard a wonderful operatic tenor voice streaming out a window of the music school — a very Italian moment. It is hot (93 degrees F), so we treated ourselves to some delicious gelato in a cool little air-conditioned store in an arcade. 

We are looking forward to one more week of traveling through northern Italy, before flying back to Philadelphia next Saturday.

Here are some pictures — in reverse chronological order.

Japanese Babies

Belgian postcards from a distance

Belgian postcard closeup

Scorpion seal made of rubber with blood?

Gigantic woolen things

Dinner with riot police

Venetian washing day

Gondola ride

St Mark’s cathedral

Ancona sunset