It was a travel day today, but a short travel day! The speedy trains in Italy meant that it was only about a 30-minute trip by rail from Florence to Bologna. But, just with the various logistics and timing, we arrived at our flat in Bologna just before noon. It is definitely in the running for the nicest AirBnB that we’ve had on this entire trip (and we’ve only had a couple that were stinkers): 2 bedrooms, each with a balcony; 2 full baths, a great living room with a balcony, and high quality furnishings all around!
Once we were settled in, we tracked down some lunch, grabbed gelato at a place a friend of Tim’s had recommended, and then decided to give the city bikes a try. They were the same brand—RideMovi—that we’d seen in Florence, but they seemed to be somewhat more available, and our electric bike guided tour in Florence had gotten us curious as to how electric city bikes were. They were…peppy! We, essentially, didn’t pedal at all as we zipped around. We rode out to the perimeter of the old city and then rode a good chunk of the perimeter itself.
Then, it was a bit more poking around to get the lay of the land, followed by heading to the Jewish quarter to find dinner. We’d been told that was a more laid back / hipster-ish part of the city. Unfortunately…it was also pretty short on open restaurants! But, eventually, we found a place and sat outside and had a good meal before heading back to the flat.
An interesting/memorable experience of the day:
Benton: the speed and range of the electric city bikes
Tim: Benton developing a minor obsession with finding a T-shirt that said something nonsensical, which had us poking our heads into various clothing stores
