Class in Bologna and weekend in Venice

Early Wednesday morning our class left for Bologna pronounced “bolo?a” which is a large University town. As a class we were required to create a lesson plan and do presentations on Bologna while we were there. We had a creative lesson plan, presented some history on the town and planned a field trip to Grom’s gelato shop which is said to have the best gelato in town. We went to lunch at a restaurant that our concierge recommended and were welcomed warmly and directed to the second floor of the restaurant which provided a private atmosphere. We took turns deciding what the restaurant had previously served as because there was an abundance of red and lamps which led some to think it had been an Asian restaurant. At the same time there were some metal handrails around holes in the floor and an eccentric wall texture which alluded to a potential club scene. One of the girls eventually called our waiter over to bring menus to us and he came bearing just two for our group of 15. Though we tried to make the best of the shortage of menus we eventually caved in and requested two more. In the end we had a good first meal in Bologna and looked forward to our next couple of days walking around the University area, visiting Modena, the Ferrari Museum and the Porticos of San Luca which encompassed a 3 mile long stretch up a hill and over 660 arches.

After our class ended in Bologna, many of us continued on to Venice to spend the weekend. Venice was an even bigger tourist attraction than Florence and many different languages were spoken up and down the streets. We were treated to sunny mornings yet fog started to set in during the afternoon and led to chilly nights which led many of us to seek shelter indoors. The Venetian glass was lovely to look at and though it was abundant in all the shops was not inexpensive by far. I could definitely see how the tourist scene affected the prices of items as a simple cookie could cost 3 euro and tourists menus were advertised everywhere in several different languages through restaurant windows. Over the course of the weekend I visited the Peggy Guggenheim which offered a wide array of paintings and sculptures. After spending six days traveling many of us looked forward to being in Rome again.