Budapest to Sighisoara- 640 km (train) 

Sighisoara to Bucharest- 280 km (train)

Bucharest to Sofia – 380 km (train)

& 63545 Fit Bit Steps

On the overnight train that runs from Budapest to Bucharest, we were wakened by shouts and banging on the door of our sleeper compartment by Hungarian border police. A stern-looking female officer spent rather a long time examining our passports before finally approving our exit from the country. About 30 minutes later, just as we had dozed off again, our door was thrown wide open and the ceiling light switched on (Paul had forgotten to lock the door after the last border check). A Romanian border police officer was now standing over us, demanding our passports. Lois, who has been reading Philippe Sands brilliant work, East West Street, thought how terrifying such a disconcerting interrogation would have been for people trying to escape Nazi occupied Europe using forged documents.

We had decided to stop for a day at Sighişoara, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Transylvania, recommended by our friend Isabel. The well preserved medieval town with its original wall and guard towers is the birthplace of Vlad the Impaler, whom Bram Stoker used as a basis for the character of Count Dracula. The souvenir shops make the most of the connection and the colour red is a big theme in dishes served in the restaurant in Vlad’s parents’ house! In Stoker’s novel, the Count’s castle was in North Eastern Romania, in the Carpathian Mountains. Paul was inspired to take out the e-book of Dracula from the Vancouver Public Library, which served him well on our long train rides in the days ahead.

In the Biserica din Deal of St Nicolas overlooking the town, there are frescoes of St George and the dragon. One of the custodians gave us a great account of two of the St George legends. The one depicted in the church was from the Golden Legend, a book from around 1260 that recorded the lives of the saints. Apparently it was a medieval best seller! The church also contains a number of wooden chests from the area that we were told were used to store food and hide jewels during times of siege.

After Sighişoara, crossing the snow-capped Carpathians, we passed through poor looking mining communities, reminders that Romania has the lowest human development index of any State in the EU. However, the country is rich in natural resources and the largest gold reserves in continental Europe are in the area of Rosia Montana. A Canadian company, Gabriel Resources, wishing to exploit the deposits has come under much criticism and protests by Romanians as result of environmental and cultural concerns.

We stayed one night in Bucharest in what remains of the old town, many buildings having been demolished under Caucescu and replaced with his own edifices. Tucked behind newer apartment blocks, we eventually found the Great Synagogue. No longer used for prayer, it houses a remarkably detailed display of materials and photographs documenting the systematic discrimination against, persecution and murder of Romanian Jews during the Second World War. Again, hundreds of thousands perished at the hands of both the Nazis and the Romanian authorities. The older gentleman who showed us around must have been old enough to remember those times if he had been there but we did not want to ask him.

To get to Sofia, we took one train to the border, the Danube, and another into Bulgaria. While waiting for the train at Ruse, we chatted with a student from Beijing who is presently studying in Berlin. He was trying to locate something to eat, to no avail. Luckily, we have been getting helpful railway advice from The Man in seat 61 (seat61.com), as recommended by our friend Helen. We were forewarned that on the 10 hour journey there was no restaurant car!

We were in Sofia less than 24 hours but were able to see a number of sites, including the gold spired Russian Church, built on the site of a Mosque, destroyed in 1882, after the Russian  liberation of Bulgaria from five centuries of rule by the Ottomans. We walked through the St Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, built between 1882 and 1912 to honour the 200,000 Russian soldiers who died fighting for Bulgarian independence. The church has thrones for both the Archbishop and the Tzar.
Although Bulgaria was an ally of Germany in both World Wars, of interest is that in WWll, Bulgaria saved its Jewish population from deportation to concentration camps.

Close by the cathedral is the Basilica of Santa Sofia. The building is in fact four churches, built over successive periods from the 4th C AD, the first constructed over a necropolis of the ancient Roman city dating from the 3rd C AD. One tomb is painted with flowers but no Christian symbols. In the 16th century, during Ottoman rule, the church was converted into a mosque.

Eastern Europe Actual Route
Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Vienna to Budapest – 240 km (train). 35175 Fit Bit steps

If Venice is the City of Light, and Vienna, the City of Music, Budapest is the City of Baths. The city earned this title in 1934, but its rich spa heritage dates back to prehistoric times. Sitting on more than 120 hot springs, Budapest’s spa culture is alive and well. We decided to try the Gellert Baths (Gellért gyógyfüdö), built in 1918 in lavish Art Nouveau style on the Buda side of the Danube. Partly destroyed by a bomb in WWll but since restored to its original splendor, the baths are an experience, with eight geothermal pools (one outside) ranging between 19oC and 40oC, indoor and outdoor swimming pools including a wave pool (summer), steam baths, dry and steam saunas and cold-dive pools. Massages and various curative treatments are also offered. Unfortunately, massages were booked up beyond the time of our stay, but we left the baths feeling well-soaked and relaxed.

In our brief wanderings along the Danube and in the old town, past the 14thC Royal Palace (Budavári palota) on the Buda bank of the Danube and the imposing Parliament of Budapest on the Pest side, completed in 1896 just before the 1000th anniversary of the founding of Hungary, we saw evidence of Hungary’s tumultuous history, not the least in the 20th C. In the gardens of the Great Synagogue (Dohány utcai Zsinagóga), completed in 1859, are monuments to victims of the holocaust and non-Jews who died helping to protect others. Nearly 440,000 Hungarian Jews were deported to death camps and thousands more were murdered or died from maltreatment. Not far from the synagogue, a 2005 installation. Shoes on the Danube, commemorates the 3500 people who, between 1944/45, were shot by the Arrow Cross militia on the banks, their bodies left to float away down the river. Sites also honoured Raoul Wallenberg and many others who saved the lives of tens of thousands of Jews in Nazi-occupied Hungary from German Nazis and Hungarian Fascists. The tumult continued after WWll when the country became a satellite state of the Soviet Union and when the 1956 revolution was brutally suppressed. We were reminded of this recently reading the novel Afterlife of Stars by Joseph Kertes.

Parkinson’s Disease note:
A study from Hungary showed that 43% of informal care for PD patients was provided by family members or volunteers and they contributed 43% direct costs. It concluded that in Hungary, PD related disability mainly burdens the patients’ families, and not the health and social care system.
Another study showed that PD represents a significant burden for the health insurance system and that drug treatment is the major cost driver.
So, disability related costs are covered largely by families, volunteers and others so that they are not accounted for as a major driver of costs to the public health system. It is interesting to note that these findings have parallels in the UK where families of people with PD are £16,582 worse off each year compared to others.

Medical History note:
We passed Semmelweis University, the oldest medical school in Hungary. Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis contributed to reducing maternal deaths in the 1800’s by promoting hand washing by physicians with chlorinated lime solution. In general, the medical profession rejected his ideas as it implicated them in the cause of illness and mortality! It was not until after his death and the acceptance of the germ theory of infection that he was shown to have been correct.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis

Coffee note: Mantra Coffee 9/10 +

Eastern Europe Actual Route
Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Venice to Vienna – 580 km (train &  9061 Fit Bit steps)

  &  33109 Fit Bit steps

Our previous itinerary had us riding through Croatia, Montenegro, Bosnia Herzegovina and Albania. Reviewing options now for travelling by bus and train made that route look less desirable. As our present objective is to head to warmer climes in Greece (!), we decided that the best route, avoiding air travel, is to take a train north to Vienna and then south again via Budapest, Bucharest and Sofia.

We didn’t see much from our train window during the 10-hr trip, as the mist hanging over the Veneto gave way to night as we crossed the border into Austria. A few degrees colder than Venice, the Austrian capital appeared quite wintry, particularly as Christmas lights and a Christmas market were just being set up (but didn’t open before we left). A stately and elegant city, its imperial architecture reflecting six centuries as the seat of Hapsburg rule, Vienna is a place we would like to visit again. Paul was first here as a university student in the 60’s, when he and his friends slept in the luggage racks of an overnight train from London!

We caught our first sight of the Danube on our morning walk around the Ringstrasse, a ring road/tramway which replaced the old city wall. Further along, we came to the Holocaust-Denkmal, a memorial to the 65,000 Austrian Jews who were murdered. Designed to look like a bunker, the sculpture depicts a library of books with their spines turned inward, representing the lost knowledge of the Holocaust victims.

Long famous as the “city of music” and amongst the numerous fine Baroque and late 19thC buildings there are statues and monuments celebrating Vienna’s heritage. Mozart watches over a park near the Heldenplatz, and Mahler, Berg and Schoenberg are commemorated outside the Vienna State Opera House. A visit to the Haus der Muzik, a museum of sound and music with a range of hi-tech interactive and multimedia presentations, including exhibitions about composers that worked in the city and the story of the Vienna Philharmonic, was interesting, but perhaps failed a bit in execution. It  didn’t help that the App for the museum didn’t work. Much more inspiring was a visit to one of Mozart’s residences. The composer stayed in many places in the city but only one building remains where he lived from 1784 to 1787. It was here that he composed the Marriage of Figaro. Standing in the apartments where he lived and composed was a privilege. We ended our visit with an enjoyable concert of chamber music by Mozart and Beethoven in the Annakirche.

Coffee notes:
Jonas Reindl 9.5/10. Vienna’s coffeehouse culture was added to the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2011. We visited one, the historic Cafe Leopold Hawelka, which was full of charm and atmosphere. More recently a newer generation of coffee shops akin to those we frequented in Vancouver and Victoria have arrived. The espresso of Jonas Reindl matches Moja in Terra Breads!

Eastern Europe Actual Route
Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Paul’s reflections on life

It is now 6 months since my bike and I were hit by a car in Italy and our cycling the globe trip was so abruptly interrupted. Although I still have bothersome symptoms from the shoulder injury, the neuropathic issues are resolving and I’m feeling more and more myself. Most importantly, I am still here and grateful to be able to continue to travel, learn and experience life together with Lois and to enjoy being a father and a grandfather.

By chance, we recently learned that the driver of the car that hit me died just months after the accident. Diagnosed with a brain tumour in July, he died in August in the same hospital where I was cared for. It is quite possible that he was experiencing symptoms in May, which caused the accident. We shall never know.

Venice – 27,535 Fit Bit steps

We first visited Venice at Easter in 2007 when we took the train from Geneva. It was no less magical the second time, now shrouded in mist and fog. To walk across the bridge over the Grand Canal is to enter another world of waterways, gondolas, narrow alleys, squares and historic buildings. We were happy to avoid the still very busy tourist spots in favour of just wandering, window shopping, Christmas shopping, photographing and eating. While we were chatting with the proprietor of Signor Blum, a handcrafted wooden toy store, costumed children came in banging pots and pans and asking for candy in celebration of the Festival of St. Martin.

We visited the Basilica dei Santi Giovanni e Paolo, with its original Murano stained glass windows, the Chiesa di Santa Maria dei Miracoli and the Ca’ Pesaro Galleria Internazionale d’Arte. In addition to its impressive international collection, the gallery has a rich collection of 20th-century canvasses and sculptures by Italian artists, including Boccioni, Martini, Wildt, Donghi, Morandi, De Chirico, and others.

In the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, we were moved by paintings depicting the Black Plague of the 14thC. Between 1350 and 1700, over 100 waves of Bubonic plague swept Europe spread westward by rats and their fleas hitchhiking on ships along the Venetian and Genovese trade routes. Historians estimate that about 75 million people died, one third of them in Europe. “Quarantine” comes from a Venetian word and indeed, in 1348, the City appointed public health guardians to try to prevent plague coming into the City. Although not wholly successful, it was a pioneering attempt at prevention. Outbreaks in Venice in the 16th and 17th centuries claimed the lives of 30% of the city’s population, leading to its ultimate demise as a world sea power. (Paul notes that the disease is still a threat in some endemic areas – see current outbreak in Madagascar). Celebrating Carnival each year, Venetians still remember their historic past. They dress up in masks and costumes that represent the Bubonic Plague, the creation of a quarantine island, a female vampire in Venice, and the impact on their history.

The threat to Venice now is not rapid, but slow and insidious, as rising sea levels caused by climate change pose new challenges for the survival of this great city, a concern highlighted by Support, a sculpture installation by Lorenzo Quinn for the Venice Biennale 2017. The artist writes that, “Venice is a floating art city that has inspired cultures for centuries, but to continue to do so it needs the support of our generation and future ones, because it is threatened by climate change and time decay.”

Venice is built over 100 low-lying islands in a salt water lagoon which is sheltered from the Adriatic Sea by the Lido- a sandbank- and other small strips of land. It is unlikely that this will survive the ravages of climate change and rising sea levels.  Even now, we saw posters showing the few alleys and routes that would be open with the high tides likely to occur this winter, not an unusual occurrence, but likely to become more frequent. We kept looking at the proximity of doors fronting on to the water and how close houses are to being inundated. The controversial 5.4B Euro MOSE flood barrier project which will insert gates in the three inlets through which water enters and leaves the lagoon, will mitigate the effects of the high tides, but are only designed to be effective for a rise in sea levels up to 80cm, so may not save Venice in the long term.

Italy Actual Route
Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Padua to Dolo – 17 km (on foot, 31,969 Fit Bit steps)

Dolo to Venice – 29 km (by bus and  17,995 Fit Bit steps)

We needed to walk and the weather looked promising. We intended to follow (in reverse) the Romeo Leona, a path which connects Venice via another route in northern Italy to the Camino de Santiago, leading to Santiago de Compostela in Spain.

Our route out of Padua took us along a flat, easy 10K track along the Canale Piovego. The Veneto region is criss crossed by multiple canals dating back centuries. Built for transportation and irrigation, they have been a main contributor to the wealth of the Veneto. For 300 years before Napoleon arrived in 1797, Venetian families packed up and vacated the city for the summer months, floating their households on barges up the canals to summer villas. Presumably it was hot, humid and malodorous at home! We passed a number of abandoned grand villas. The imposing house and gardens of the Villa Pisani Nazionale (1774), close to Stra, was the Doge of Venice’s way of reminding everyone who was in charge, even outside the city.

While the path we were on did not appear to be signposted (the route was described online by Friends if the Camino), we did notice signs for the Cammino di Sant’Antonio and the Cammino dei Giusti del mondo. On the latter, the only information on the web is in Italian, but with google translate we learned that it leads to a garden in Padua that recognizes “righteous people” who helped others during times of genocide, not only the holocaust, which decimated the Jewish population of Venice, but also Armenia, Rwanda and Serbia. There are other such gardens in Yerevan and Sarajevo. One of the people celebrated is Gino Bartali, a racing cyclist who had won the Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France between the two world wars. Under the guise of training, he carried photographs of Jews in hiding from Florence to Lucca for the creation of forged papers to enable their escape. Also, he pulled a wagon purportedly to help in his training in which he smuggled Jews from Assisi to the Swiss border.

At Stra, the Naviglio Brenta (canal) begins its journey towards the Lagoon of Venice. Unfortunately, the canal path disappeared here and we were forced to walk for several kilometres on a narrow shoulderless road on which cars passed uncomfortably close to us (sound familiar?). Stopping in Dolo for the night, after confirming that the route continues on a busy road, we decided to abandon the walk and continue on by bus to Venice.

Wildlife note: Kingfisher

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Verona to Padua 81 km (train) & 

17,368 & 2 days of 34,527 Fit Bit steps

Padua was another gem. Even the dark chilly November rain couldn’t keep us inside, although we were grateful to be able to hop the trams to avoid the steady drizzle. Highlights of our visit include:

• The Eremitani civic museum for a crucifix by Giotto (once in the Scrovegni Chapel) frescoes by Giotto and his school, and paintings by Tintoretto;
• The  Scoletta del Santo for frescoes by Titian, which we viewed with no one else in the hall;
• The stunning Capella degli Scrovegni, which is adorned almost entirely with Giotto’s frescoes (completed in only 2 years). Apparently Dante and da Vinci honoured Giotto as the artist who ended the Dark Ages with these paintings!
• The Palazzo della Ragione which from 1218 housed the city tribunal, with lower floor markets still active today. The great hall contains a huge wooden statue of a horse from the 15thC and frescoes by Giotto’s “acolytes”;
• A guided tour of the Palazzo del Bò, part of the University of Padua, sitting in the (law) hall where Galileo taught students of University of Padua in the late 16thC and viewing the World’s first anatomy theatre where Versalius taught dissection. Paul remembers the anatomical drawings of Vesalius from medical school. The first woman ever to receive an academic degree, Elena Cornaro was awarded a PhD in Padua in 1656. She had wanted to pursue a degree in Theology but at that time the Church did not sanction women students;
• Braving the elements to visit the Oro Botanico, the worlds first botanical gardens founded in 1545 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The modern garden of biodiversity (fortunately inside and warm!) emphasized the challenges of climate change and environmental loss. The oldest plant is a palm from 1585 and is now referred to a Goethe’s palm as he referred to it in an essay;
• An excellent film performance of Verdi’s Nabucco by L’Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège and starring Leo Nucci shown at the Piccolo Teatro Don Bosco.This compensated in part for not seeing the opera live in Milan. We had to check the synopsis on Wikipedia before and during the intermission as the subtitles were, not surprisingly, in Italian. Slices of hot pizza were available at intermission!

Coffee notes: Caffé Diemme 9/10

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Milan to Verona – 165 km (train) &

18,065 Fit Bit steps

There is no end of fascinating places to visit in Italy. Verona is yet another. The city is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site because of its urban structure and architecture, which includes a 1st century Roman Arena, home of world renowned opera performances in the summer, and the rediscovered Roman theatre across the river. Although Verona preserved many ancient Roman monuments no longer in use in the early Middle Ages, much of this and much of its early medieval edifices were destroyed or heavily damaged by an earthquake in 1117, which led to a massive Romanesque rebuilding. From our hotel, we could see the Torre dei Lamberti, an impressive 84 m-high watchtower begun in the 12th C and finished in the 15th C. It stands next to the Arche scaligere, a group of five unusual (but not necessarily edifying)  Gothic funerary monuments celebrating the Scaliger family, who ruled in Verona from the 13th to the late 14th century.

Of course, Verona is also famous as the setting for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. While Shakespeare’s characters are fictional, the enterprising city capitalized on the association in the 1930’s to construct the balcony of Juliet on a house in Via Cappello (think Capulet). A bronze statue of Juliet also stands in the square. Shakespeare is not mentioned at the site but is recognized by a plaque with a quote from the play and a bronze bust tucked away by one of the city gates.

Chancing upon an excellent retrospective exhibition of the Colombian painter, Fernando Botero, we both came away with a better appreciation of his art and his signature style. His interpretations of some classics like Raphael’s “La Fornarina” are wonderful. In reading about Botero, we learned of his series of drawings of the humiliation and torture of the Alu Ghraib prisoners in Iraq. These can be seen on the web and are disturbing.

There was much more we could have explored but we also enjoyed simply wandering, stopping for tea, pastries, local wines and cichetti (Italian tapas).

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Milan to Gravedona return- 232 km (train and bus) & 13,436 Fit Bit steps

Visit to Ospedale Classificato Moriggia Pelascini, in Gravedona

We travelled by train and bus to the foothills of the Alps north of Milan to visit the Ospedale Classificato  Moriggia Pelascini, in Gravedona on Lake Como. Through an introduction kindly made by Dr. Joaquim Ferreira (Portugal), we had arranged to meet Prof. Giuseppe Frazzitta, head of the Parkinson’s Neurorehabilitation department. A delightful man, Dr. Frazzitta spoke to us at length about the program, introduced us to his colleagues and arranged for us to tour the unit with one of his senior staff. We very much appreciated the opportunity to visit this unique, state of the art facility with its warm and friendly atmosphere.

The 56-bed department was set up by Dr. Frazzitta five years ago primarily to provide hospital-based treatment for persons with PD who do not respond to pharmacological treatment. The aim of the 4-week program is to use the best possible equipment and highly specialised non-drug treatments in order to improve patients’ functionality and independence. Caregivers may also stay at the hospital and participate in the program. People are followed up 12 months after discharge. The treatment is completely covered by the Italian heath care system. For persons from outside Italy, the cost of the program is approximately €10,000 There is a year’s waiting list to get into the program.

On arrival, individuals are assessed and an individualized program is drawn up, which includes the participation of neurologists, physiatrists (physician specialist in rehabilitation) physical therapists, speech therapists, neuropsychologists, and nurses. In particular, the daily schedule includes one hour of face-to-face treatment with expert physiotherapists in order to improve body function and motor performance; an hour of treatment with the most modern and specific rehabilitation equipment; finally, a third treatment with exercises to improve hand function and independence in daily activities. In addition, patients with speech and swallowing disorders follow a group speech therapy-rehabilitation program. An individualized rehabilitation program is used for patients with Parkinsonism (multiple-system atrophy and progressive supranuclear palsy).

A study authored by Dr. Frazzitta and others compared a group of patients in the intermediate stage of the disease who had undergone intensive rehabilitation treatment and a group with no rehabilitation treatment; it showed that there was significant difference between the groups in the clinical evaluation and all the advantages were in the rehabilitation group. Even more interesting, the rehabilitation group were able to reduce their drug dosages, while the control group required further increases in drug dosages without any increased benefit.

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Ravenna to Milan – 299 km (train & bus) &

 13,722 & 2 days of 35,674 Fit Bit steps

Milan deserves its reputation as a world class city, for its style, history and culture, past and present. Not knowing what to expect, we enjoyed our time in this cosmopolitan, open and lively city.

Our primary reason for visiting Milan was to see da Vinci’s « Last Supper », also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This was another thrilling experience for both of us. The subject is the reaction of the apostles to the news that one of them was going to betray him. Although the painting has undergone numerous repairs and restorations over the centuries, it has a unique presence. Not technically a fresco, as da Vinci painted it « dry » (a new technique the painter was trying, which soon resulted in deterioration), the Last Supper remains in its original place on the wall of the refectory of the former Dominican convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie. The painting’s survival in situ is even more remarkable given the fact that Napoleon’s troops used the wall of the refectory for target practice during the revolutionary war, and, in 1943, the walls of the Convent were heavily damaged by an Allied bomb after which the work of art was left in the open air for a few years. The most recent restoration was completed in 1999 where several scientific methods were used to restore the original colors as close as possible, and to eliminate traces of paint applied in previous attempts to restore the work.

Seeing the inside of the Teatro La Scala was also special. Unfortunately, the only opera tickets available for Nabucco were totally out of our budget. A tour guide explained that before Toscanini became musical director in the 1920’s, audiences were undisciplined, arriving late and with more concern for the social aspect of attending the opera. This explains the circular layout of the theatre, which was designed more to allow spectators to be seen than to enable them to view the performance.

Close by La Scala is the Duomo of Milan which dominates the central piazza of the city. The impressive building took 600 years to complete (canals were dug specifically for the purpose of transporting marble from 100km away) and the interior is an interesting mix of styles. A disturbing sculpture of the martyred Saint Bartholomew, Flayed, holds his own skin like a cloak.

Also in the piazza, the Museo del Novecento houses a great collection of Italian art from the 20th century.

Leaving the city from the Milano Centrale train station, we were again both appalled and impressed with this colossal edifice from the fascist era, with its three huge halls designed to dominate and intimidate.

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route

Urbino to Ravenna – 135 km (train & bus) &

16,112 & 1 day 11,804 Fit Bit steps

Ravenna’s eight listings as UNESCO World Heritage Sites recognize the city’s unique collection of early Christian mosaics and monuments, dating back to the 5th to 8th centuries. As capital of the Western Holy Roman Empire and later, the Eastern (Byzantine) Holy Roman Empire, the mosaics and buildings constructed during this time have added significance due to the blending of western and eastern motifs and techniques representative of that era. We were awed and fascinated by the outstanding quality of the colourful detailed religious and funerary images, from the small Neonian Baptistry to the grand Basilica of San Vitale. It was sobering to go into the Church of San Giovanni Evangelista  to find partially reconstructed mosaics recovered after the building was almost totally destroyed in a Allied bombing raid in 1944.

We also experienced a lively modern day Ravenna as there was a wine and food festival on. Booths in a number of plazas showcased Sangiovese and Romagna’s other wines, cheeses and street food, such as the delicious piadina – a thin Italian flatbread, typically prepared in the Romagna historical region, which can be filled with cheese, meats or vegetables. We enjoyed more local cuisine at an enoteca and restaurant, Ca’ de Vèn, recommended by our B&B, which was so good we ate there twice.

Italy Actual Route

Lisbon to Auckland Actual Route