Ciao da Verona!!

Ciao daVerona!
The place I am staying at is fabulous! At the risk of sounding like an old person, it will be fabulous to be able to make a cup of tea when I want to, there were no facilities for that at the B & B at S.M., we weren't allowed to ask for cutlery or plates etc. I wouldn't stay there again, it was close to everything but that's about it. One afternoon the son who was the breakfast 'cook' (boiled eggs was the extent of his cooking) had a roaring argument with someone, it went from the front of the place to the garden to inside downstairs to upstairs on the landing near my room which I didn't like very much considering it went on for almost an hour, worst of it was I couldn't understand a word! (Sorry Lou!).

I was listening in bed one morning and I came to the conclusion that they wanted everyone to have their breakfast early so they could get on with their day so they stand in the kitchen and clang cups and plates and spoons together - if everything is set at the table and all they do when you walk in is bring you coffee WTF are the clanging in the kitchen???

I spent my last morning at Santa Magherita Lingura wandering around filling in time until my train left, then I was on the train in a carriage with 5 other women - all in their 60s I'd say -who all knew each other, they were all talking to each other at the same time as talking on their phones pronto pronto - going through a tunnell - PRONTOOOOOOOOOOO - I nearly burst out laughing at one stage.

That train left 20 minutes late so when it finally arrived in Milan I had 10 minutes to find my train to Verona and get on it with my stupid case which is much better since I sent stuff home but it's still stupid. Now I just let it fall behind me when I am going down stairs - you can hear me coming, bang, bang, bang, going upstairs I make a big show of one step at a time and someone usually helps me, not always, but usually, same goes for getting it up on to a train, getting it off a train is easy, I have worked out to just lay it down and lift it that way. So far I have only been on one train when I had to put it up on a luggage rack, that was my first train and I had no idea where to go or what to do so I asked a guy standing at the plaform, he was so helpful, dragged my case from one end of the platform to the other, found the carriage, found my seat, lifted my case up then turned around and asked for 5 euro! Then a young guy lifted it down for me when it was my station. He did it for free. Since then I have had trains I could leave it in a space near the door but I don't like leaving it out of my sight either.

This morning I set out for Verona after freaking church bells woke me at 7, no-one in Italy needs an alarm clock because I am convinced that every church in the country is syncronised for 7am! I walked in to Verona, about a 10 minute walk, and had set out with the plan to get the 'on-off' bus to the train station to organise my ticket to Venice on Thursday, then after that wander around.

(crossing the bridge on my way in to Verona)

(Nuns don't just fly, they ride bikes too!)

Wrong! I started wandering, couldn't help it, and found myself checking out Juliet's balcony, the main piazza and mini market there (got the t-shirt to prove it), the buildings around there, the other piazzas that run off the main piazza, checking out underground Roman ruins and tombs, towers, clocks, people etc. then I wandered in the direction of the arena, thinking it would be as far to go as it is in Rome but no - wrong again! a few blocks away and there it was.

(Juliet's)

(Working at Piazza Erbe)

(whalebone arch)

(Verona Arena)

I paid my 6euro to go and check it out, it's quite big and a bit eerie underneath but they have gates every few meters in the archways so there's light coming in and you can see open so it's not claustric! I walked up to the top thinking I would see a great veiw of Verona - wrong - they have it blocked off, they must be doing works to the top because I couldn't get all the way to the top and couldn't see the view.

(Underground at Verona Arena)

From there, I got on the bus, went to the station, organised my ticket, got back on the bus and back in to Verona centre where I got off and wandered some more. Tomorrow I will get on the bus again and check out a few other places.
I have discovered that I have a terrible sense of direction - even with a map - everywhere I go I discover I am going the absolute and total opposite direction to the way I think I am going. In Rome I was almost at Vatican City and I was sure I was near the train station when I was actually walking furher and further away fom it. That's not such a huge problem now that my feet have settled down a little, they don't seem to mind my getting lost so much now. Getting lost is not such a bad thing though, I have found some fabulous things when I've been lost!

(gothic tomb of Scaligieri family - very goth!)