Verona

After our afternoon at Lago di Garda we doubled back to Verona for the night and the following day. Our hotel was a couple km outside of the historic city, but we parked just outside the city walls and headed across the pedestrian bridge into the historic city:

Next we headed into the main square at the center of the city, which contained crowded sidewalks, restaurants, open markets, fountains, and a huge open-air opera arena.



Next we headed down to the one tourist attraction in the city that Kari really wanted to see, the House of Juliet, where, reportedly, the woman who was the inspiration for Shakespeare once lived.

You walk through a dark covered entryway to get to the house, and people have covered every reachable inch of the walls of the walkway with "letters to Juliet"


"Juliet's" balcony:

There's a statue of Juliet in front of the house, and apparently a tradition has developed where it's considered good luck to touch a certain part of the statue's anatomy as you pass. It's pretty obvious just by looking at the color and shine of the statue.

A cute little girl having her picture taken before Kari went up to pose:


Next we headed over to the duomo, which was, unfortunately, just closing for the day by the time we got there

We also walked past this gorgeous church and square (I can't remember what they were called, though):



On our way back to the car we walked along the river that divides Verona in half and got to enjoy this incredible view:

We're in Turin now after the long drive from Verona, and are sadly heading home tomorrow afternoon. We have a quick flight to Paris and then just an hour and a half layover, so we're assuming our time in the Paris airport is going to be rushed regardless, but we've also heard on the news that the French air traffic controllers are striking, which means anything could happen as we try to get back. If you ask me, though, a delay that meant we had to spend the night in an airline-paid-for hotel in Paris really wouldn't be a tragedy.

-Dan