Romantic Route Venice - Padua - Verona

Über das Reiseziel: Perhaps no city is as fabulous as Venice, a metropolis built upon pilings, a labyrinth poised over a lagoon. Venice has been called the drawing room of Europe, and indeed for centuries the city was a sanctuary for ideas and idealists, a crossroad of the Byzantine and Roman worlds. Today Venice is a different kind of drawing room. Wealthy visitors clamber into gondolas to gawk at the Byzantine palaces while being serenaded by accordionists and art appreciators stand on tiptoe for a glimpse of Renaissance masterpieces. No monument is as memorable as the city itself, so use the major sights only as an excuse for wandering. Venice revolves around piazza San Marco. The best feature of the mosaic-covered Basilica di San Marco is the Pala D’Oro, a glittering gold Byzantine bas-relief. The Torre dell’Orologio, left of San Marco, is a beautifully embellished clock tower. For culture vultures check the Accademia for the best of Venetian paintings. Some say that the tourist Venice is indeed Venice, but there are other Venices as well. To find them, wander away from the major sights and into the quieter outlying residential neighbourhoods, you won’t be disappointed, this maze of stone and colour exudes enchantment from every brick.

About the destination: Padua is an Italian province with capital in the city of the Veneto. It is bordered to the north by the province of Treviso, to the east by the province of Venice, to the south by the province of Rovigo and to the west by the province of Verona and the province of Vicenza.

About the destination: Set amid endless vineyards and cypress groves, this melange of Roman ruins, pink palazzi and fanciful sepulchres has a romantic beauty that is difficult to over-praise. Shakespeare set Romeo and Juliet here, and would likely be amused to know that his imaginary lovers have become Verona’s hottest tourist attraction. Nonetheless, Verona has more to offer than just Romeo and Juliet. In Verona’s centre, Brà square, there is the almost perfectly preserved Roman Arena. Up via Mazzini from the Arena is piazza delle Erbe, where corny gadgets are sold amid the Renaissance palazzo of former Veronese merchants and has a lively atmosphere with pretty cafes and dazzling restaurants. Through an arch on the right are piazza dei Signori and the Tombs of the Scaligeri, the peculiar Gothic remnants of della Scalla, Verona’s medieval tyrants. The equestrian statue of Cangrande I, head of the Scalla clan is a glorification of raw power and can be visited at the museum of Castelvecchio. But if you are an incurable romantic, at 23 via Cappello you’ll find Juliet’s house, where lovers graffiti their hopeful pleas. The house where Romeo used to live is now a bar. This ancient city exudes history from every brick and is well worth a visit.

About the destination: Peschiera offers its visitors visible signs of every historical era through which it has lived: from the age of pile-dwellers (stilt-house inhabitants) during the Roman Age, and from the early to late Medieval years in which the Scala Family ruled, to the period of Venetian nomination, then the Napoleonic Empire, and finally to the Hapsburg rule, when Peschiera was one of the four fortresses of the Austrian Quadrilatero, at the time the most powerful defensive system in Italy. Peschiera was equally-important during Italian Unification and then, in the First World War. Such is attributed to its geographic position, leading to its use as a strategic hub in terms of communications between the Alpine and Padania regions of the country, in addition to those between east and west. That is, Peschiera lies on Lake Garda’s southernmost point (part of the Veneto Region and Verona Province), where the Lake becomes the Mincio Bayou and, at the same time, a tributary of the Po River running into the Adriatic Sea.