Pretty Bologna

a pastry shop

all the fixin's for dinner

market street

one of the many beautiful arcades

view from our hotel room

All the buildings have covered arcades, painted with beautiful frescos or just beautifully vaulted. The old city centre is a wonderful place to wander around, peek into shops or have a drink at cafes with seats spilling into the arcades. It is Easter and the special cakes of Pasqua is found in every shop, reminds me of Panetone at Christmas. I went into a shop to get one, there was a long line to pay, you pay first, take your receipt to one of the shop girls who'll then hand you a cake. At 20 euros, it wasn't cheap but we enjoyed it and made a mess in the hotel room because the crumbs fell every where.

It is a long walk from the train station to our hotel. When we first arrived, we did take a taxi but once we were there, we quickly learnt the bus system and took the bus the rest of our stay.

We wandered around the markets of the old centre, it is really pretty. The beautiful produce looked like art, there are hams and sausages hanging from the rafters. We went in a store that sold home cooked food, we picked out dinner- a few veal cutlets, some salad and some vegetables, a few pieces of chicken and we ate in our hotel room, one of the nights we were there.

Another time we sat down for capuccino, I said, 'due capuccino, per favore'. The manager corrected me, he said, 'due capuccini'. So now I say to myself all the time, 'uno capuccino, due capuccini'. He brought us our coffee with a glass of water. You are supposed to chase your coffee with water, a very Arabic thing to do, after all the Arabs discovered coffee, they call it 'arabica'. I saw it done in Sicily but they never brought us water to chase our coffee. I guess you have to ask for it in Sicily.

All day at work, I was thinking, Europe is the only thing worth doing in this life, forget about beaches in Cancun or Hawaii, or the rainforests of South America.

When is my next trip?