Day 68: The City of Star-Crossed Lovers

Date: Wednesday 4^th June
Staying: Camping Castel San Pietro – Verona, Italy
Distance Travelled: 83.8 Miles
Song of the day: Romeo – Basement Jaxx

Cam and I couldn’t leave Fusina without a cooked breakfast, and besides, we had promised Michelle (the one from Sydney), that we would drop by. So, fuelled with eggs and caffeine, we said a sad farewell to Fusina, trying to look ahead to the cool things we’d be seeing in Verona.

We only had one night scheduled for Verona, so the aim was to arrive early and spend the afternoon doing the tourist thing. For a change, we had instructions from Via Michelin (one of those sites where you put in the start and end points and it works out the route for you). Of course, it didn’t help us one iota, since instructions are really only useful if the place you are going has street names. Which Verona doesn’t. After stopping at a service station, buying a map, and getting instructions from the staff, we headed off again. In the wrong direction. Fortunately we realised our mistake after 4 or 5 km (and the sign which told us we’d just left Verona), turned around, and embarked on the long and winding road that led us to our campsite just inside the old city walls. There we were given the teeniest camp spot I’ve ever seen (literally less than 2 inches on either side to back the van into). This was not Fusina.

However, now that we were parked we could head into Verona, which we did via Castel San Pietro, which gave us a great view out over the city. First priority was to get some food, which we did down a little side street off the main piazza, where we were served by a lovely woman who even helped me out with my limping Italian (must remember that “il conto” is “the bill”).

Now, Verona is all about Romeo and Juliet, and every tourist stall is covered in (very) tacky merchandise. They have even designated a house as the Capulets residence, even though they were (of course) entirely a figment of Shakespeare’s imagination. We did the required visit to Juliet’s balcony, where the walls of the residence are entirely covered in protestations of undying love. We also visited the amphitheatre, where every year they hold a world-renown opera season. Unfortunately we were a bit early (the season starts mid-June), but the Aida set was already up, looking very Egyptian.

As night fell, we were treated to a spectacular view from the campsite of Verona by night. Cam took the opportunity to get out the tripod and take some night shots. We finally fell into bed at midnight, exhausted and having a long drive to Lake Como in the morning.