Verona is wonderful! We arrived at around 11am. Firstly, we visited Verona Arena, an amazingly preserved Roman amphitheatre. It was so cool and had great views of the surrounding city and Alps in the distance.
Next we walked to Piazza Erbe and Piazza Signori, which were both beautiful but annoyingly rammed with markets. In between these piazzas is the Torre dei Lamberti. We decided not to visit the tower as we had just seen great views from the Arena, but we did go to the art gallery underneath it. My favourite piece there was L’Orgia by Torquato Della Torre, a marble sculpture of a young naked women, with lushious curly hair, slouched on a chair and surrounded by dark imagery (skull, bat, snake, grotesques, etc.). It was so great, and I (Jemma) really felt that I was a kindred soul with the woman depicted.
After this we went to see the Scaliger Tombs – two huge raised gothic tombs next to an otherwise unassuming church.
Around the corner was the house of Romeo! Verona definitely milks the Shakespeare connection, and the tourists have made their mark by graffitiing the walls of the house attributed to Romeo. Back to near Piazzo Erbe is the house of Juliet which you can actually visit. Again, the tourists and the pilgrims had left their tokens of love and respect for our star-crossed lovers, in the form of graffiti and chewing gum stuck to the walls – so gross!! There was also a sexy statue of Juliet for you to grab boobs and have a photo with. Although it felt wrong to sexualise a teen character like this, we got caught up in the excitement and did it anyways. We then went inside the house attributed to the Capulet family, which was really nice but had very little information about the people who actually lived there. It was mainly for tourists to take photos on the balcony, which we also did.
Next, we visited the church of Santa Anastasia. This is my favourite church so fair. Beautiful painted renaissance interior, and containing the Pisanello fresco of George and the Princess. I love seeing churches that haven’t been baroque-n! After this we went to the cathedral of Santa Maria Matriculate. The cathedral interior had lots of interesting frescos, but with baroquified chapels. The complex also included a Romanesque church of John the Baptist, and ruins of a 4th century church.
We crossed over the river by the Roman bridge, Ponte Pietra, and bought delicious hot chocolate from a vender on there. On the other side of the river we saw the ruins of a Roman theatre and climbed San Pietro’s hill for beautiful views of the city. The sky was so pink with the setting sun.
For dinner, we got some bread, cheese and wine, and are them on a Piazza close to Romeo’s house. Best dining experience you could wish for!
We finished up the day in a nice bar with an aperol spritz and made plans for the days ahead.
After returning to the van, Simon managed to brush his teeth with a foot cream. Just picked the wrong tube. My favourite moment of my life ever.
