Bologna has continued to live up to the standards set by the initial impressions. We’re only getting more and more drawn in by its charm. Bologna’s visual aesthetics are not ostentatious or in-your-face. Beyond the ubiquitous Porticos whose appearances range from the functionally spartan to the downright grandiose, one of the continually reinforced impressions is how clean they are managing to keep the city. Not only in terms of the general absence of refuse on the streets and alleys or the dialed-back graffiti that have ruined so many walls elsewhere, the overall repair of the buildings reveal a commitment its citizens seem to feel that their city stay as beautiful as possible. Nothing against the southern cities, but if one were to rank Italian cities on a subjective overall visual appeal, Bologna would rank very high in my view.
Suffice to say, Bologna has exceeded my expectations that in no way were low to begin with. Given that, it’s fair to wonder why we wouldn’t spend every waking minute trying to eke out as much as possible from this Emilia-Romagna jewel. Why go on day trips at all? Well, despite this being a close-to three month trip, it is still a survey of select Italian cities and as such we need to venture out on occasion. When we’re staying in a town for a week, we aim to do two, and in exceptional cases three, day trips to explore some of the surrounding towns. Today was a double feature including Parma and Modena.
Parma is a quaint, rather small town, an hour or so by train from Bologna. Unsurprisingly, the Parmamanians (sure, why not?) take their hams very seriously. Since we have relaxed our otherwise predominantly vegetarian meal-plan, we deemed that it could be interesting to visit a town to see to which degree they are shaped by what has put them on the map. While Parma is just as picturesque as one would imagine a rather small country-side Italian town to be, I can say with certainty it is not a pilgrimage for budget-minded carnivores. 35 Euro per kg of Prosciutto Crudo is on the high side for me. I don’t care if the little piggies were rubbed by virgins, my palate isn’t sophisticated enough to be rewarded with such frivolities.
Instead of blasting back directly to Bologna, we decided that the second bird for our one stone would be a stop on the way back – Modena. Modena is probably most famous for being a town where my sister occasionally goes to work, but some people may also have picked up on that it is the place where one would go to get Balsamico. This ‘Aceto’ that adds a distinct and incomparable dimension to Italian cuisine, is as far as I understand it almost exclusively from there. People who have not had a 24-36 month old Balsamico with similarly aged Parmigiano Reggiano have something new to look forward to. As for Modena itself, it is substantially larger than Parma (though still dwarfed by Bologna) and is worthwhile to visit for the architecture alone. It is figuratively littered with piazzas, both grand and cosy and it is as clean as a Swiss airport. We made one slight error however, we paid to trudge up the tower by the main cathedral thinking it would reveal a mind-blowing panoramic of the town that is so promising when ground-level. Not only were we just allowed up some 2/3 of the height of it, at the ‘top’ we were greeted with small windows (which were not to be opened on pain of death) covered by exterior steel grates effectively robbing us of any meaningful view of the town. The top of the Florence Duomo felt very far away.
[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://[2600:1f13:e3b:9100:ae18:b451:18d2:e990]/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_20170516_105737.jpg” show_in_lightbox=”off” url_new_window=”off” use_overlay=”off” animation=”left” sticky=”off” align=”left” force_fullwidth=”off” always_center_on_mobile=”on” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]Inside the cathedral in Parma. The vibrancy and light of the frescoes were not captured fully on my Nexus 5.
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