On day eight of our Italian adventure, we got up early to travel to the town of Verona.  In beautiful Verona, we took a walking tour and had family dinner.  It rained all evening, so I didn’t get to explore the city much.  However, Verona is great and definitely my favorite city that we have visited so far.

On the walking tour, we visited various sites of interest within the city.  First, we stopped at the coliseum, which is still mostly standing despite being so old.  The outer wall has since been destroyed, and only four arches are left from that part of the coliseum.  Nearby, we viewed a map of the city on the ground.  The city center is actually a large grid and is very easy to navigate.  The tour guide joked that it’s impossible to get lost.  The city itself is actually really small, and we waked diagonally from end to end.  On the way, we saw the window that Romeo wooed Juliet at, the tombs of some important influencers in the city’s history, and the clock tower.  I plan on climbing to the top if time permits, because the view is probably really beautiful.  Below the clock tower is the market with various goods being sold.  We ended the tour at the bridge on the edge of the city center, which had a beautiful view; the featured image shows our view from the bridge.  Unfortunately, to get to dinner, we had to retrace our steps from the entirety of the tour and walked all the way back past the hotel in the rain.  The streets are marble here so I was kind of disappointed I didn’t see anyone slip and fall.  Dinner was good and I found out Luca the tour guide is a fan of Borat and Superbad so I have a lot more respect for him now.  Looking forward to Venice tomorrow.

One thing I learned about Italian culture is that grabbing the breast of a certain statue underneath Juliet’s famous window is said to bring good luck.  At first I thought people were just being indecent, but that is just one example of cultural differences.