Verona | Where in the world are the Gills?

Verona

From Verona to Mantua

Posted on October 7, 2022 by Joe and Sarah Gill

Hence from Verona art thou banishèd.
Be patient, for the world is broad and wide.
Friar Lawrence to Romeo (Romeo & Juliet. 3.3.16-17)

Our Verona tour guide told us that Romeo rode his horse to Mantua but the city gates were closed due to plague. William Shakespeare wrote that Romeo receives a letter in Mantua from Juliet and is briefly happy before being wrongly told that his wife is dead. This disturbing news prompts Romeo to purchase poison from a Mantovan apothecary and race back to Verona to commit suicide.

While our Veronese guide seemed to believe that Shakespeare’s play Romeo & Juliet was a documentary, we know that Willy was inspired by Ovid, da Porto, and Bandello. Matteo Bandello lived in Mantua in the 16th century, working as a soldier, monk, and short-story writer. The historic piazzas and Renaissance buildings built on top of Medieval buildings makes it interesting to walk around town pretending to be Romeo.

Courtyard behind Basilica di Sant’Andrea

We toured Museo di Palazzo d’Arco with an Italian-speaking guide. The museum provided an english-language booklet that described each room and the artworks contained therein. We took some pictures in the garden before the tour began, but were transfixed by the indoor furnishings, paintings, and sculptures and forgot to take photos! This overwhelming assemblage, which dates back several centuries from the aristocratic d’Arco family, was donated to the city in 1973 and art history students are kept busy each year tracing the provenance of the undocumented paintings in this huge collection.

Arma virumque cano
thus begins Virgil’s epic poem, The Aeneid

*We picnicked in this garden dedicated to Virgil, born near Mantua in 70 BC.*

We really enjoyed our three nights in Mantova (Mantua) and could happily return for a longer visit. The municipality limits car/truck traffic (ZTL – Zona a Traffico Limitato) in the old city center which encourages pedestrians and cyclists to access local businesses, including an abundance of cafés and restaurants. The market on Thursdays stretches across several piazzas and side streets and offers just about anything you might be looking for. We purchased fabric (4+ metres for only €5), shorts (€2), sewing needles and thread for a button repair, and ingredients for our picnic lunch.

We are impressed with the clean streets, bicycle commuters, and friendliness of locals. Our Airbnb apartment was well-appointed; it included a washing machine with detergent, daily maid service, and coupons for breakfast at a local café.

Categories: botanical gardens, Mantua, responsible tourism, retirement travel, Verona | Tags: airbnb, gelato, mantova, palazzo, piazza, renaissance architecture, virgil | Leave a comment

Balliamo sul mondo

Posted on October 1, 2022 by Joe and Sarah Gill

It was drizzling as we arrived in Verona, but undeterred crowds draped in improvised rain ponchos were lined up outside the 2000-year-old L’Arena, waiting for Italian pop star, Ligabue. Over the next five nights, we learned the rhythms of his set as our apartment was just a few metres around the corner from this ancient open-air venue. As we walked home from dinner each night, we enjoyed seeing fans of all ages wearing concert tour shirts and headbands (!) while singing along. Sarah read that he is touring 30 years of hits in one hour. How cool that a 20,000-seat amphitheater completed in 30 A.D. (50 years BEFORE the Roman Colosseum) is still hosting large-scale concerts and events?

We open in Venice, we next play Verona, then on to Cremona,
Lots of laughs in Cremona, eh boys, our next jump in Parma, that dopy mopie menace,
And Mantua and Padua, and then we open again. Where?
Song by Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and Sammy Davis Jr.

We joined a tour guide on Saturday morning to get the lay of the land. The weather was sunny and warm, after a week of rain, so locals and tourists thronged the squares, shops, and cafés. Our guide was a bit scripted and probably better suited to telling stories to young children, but we persevered and the walk around the major points of interest helped us find new alleys to explore on our own later. Weirdly, our guide was fixated on re-telling Shakespeare’s fictional tale “The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet” as if it really happened. When we pointed out the incongruity of a twentieth century balcony built in the small courtyard of a former inn being linked to a fictional 12th century window overlooking orchards, we were gently shushed and promised that she would soon reveal the true story to us. We stopped protesting and focused on taking pictures of the range of architectural styles in Verona.