The Fat One, The Learned One, the Red One
Monday 7th May
Google started bleating it’s alarm at 5.15 this morning, so early that the birds had only just rolled out of bed and were singing in a half-arsed way. After a quick shower and a smoked salmon sandwich (it needed eating up), we got our Bat Cab to T5 Heathrow. We have been using Bat Cabs for about twenty-five years, and stick with them because they are our Local Cab Company for Local People, and it also has a very cool name.
Terminal 5 is an enormous shed with many overpriced shops and some reasonably priced cafes, Pret always being our usual cafe of choice for buying a froffy coffee to get us revived. They can always create a cappuccino at a remarkable speed which is how I like it. Unlike Kew Gardens, where coffee in the Orangery is produced at the growing speed of a Quercus Robur. Our flight, BA0540, left on time and arrived two hours later in northeast Italy. The Alps glistened like an over-iced Christmas cake, and Italy looked lush and prosperous from thirty-four thousand feet.
A taxi (€20) took us straight to our AirBnB in Via dell ‘Unione in central Bologna. A lady who knew very little English let us into the flat, which is probably more secure as Wormwood Scrubs. There is a heavy locked door onto the street, a locked iron gate with four bolts, another locked iron gate and finally the door to the flat, which is made of steel and is three inches thick. The interior of the flat is very modern and minimalist and newly decorated. It has two TVs, both of which show only Italian TV without anything in English. Even the English and US shows are dubbed in Italian. It’s a myth that Italian TV consists only of game shows hosted by Silvio Berlusconi where women take their clothes off, I checked every channel very carefully.
Our AirBnB host made us a reservation for lunch at Trattoria Broccaindosso, a short walk away. You can’t actually get Spag Bol in Bologna and come to that you can’t get Chilli Con Carne or Chicken Tikka Masala either. But you can get Tagliatelle Ragu, which is good, but disappointingly similar to the food I cook at home. But it was very good with a glass of red wine. The service was perfunctory, I think the waiter got the ‘ump because we only had one course.
Bologna is famous for its porticos, most of the footpaths in the old city are covered by vaulted roofs supported by columns. There are forty kilometres of colonnades which protect pedestrians from the rain and sun. The city is known as Bologna The Fat, Bologna The Learned and Bologna The Red. It is acknowledged as the foodie capital of Italy, hence The Fat. It has the oldest university in the Western world founded in 1088 and is still swarming with students, which is why it is The Learned. The city is known for its Communist and Socialist city council, so that gives the name The Red.
We were recommended Bologna by two sets of friends, and it didn’t disappoint us. The entire city centre is made up of 14th, 15th and 16th-century buildings, the architecture is wonderful. I walked around with my head up all the time, much to the annoyance of other pedestrians.
A waiter called Micky recommended some bars to us, so we went on a wild goose chase round central Bologna to try and find them. The only one we found had some sort of literary meeting going on, so we gave up the search and ended up in a bar near the Two Towers. Don’t bother looking for Gandalf and Frodo, these towers are just medieval big show-off phallus’s. In the early Middle Ages, there was competition between the noble families to see who could build the tallest brick tower. The Asinelli family won with a ninety-seven-meter monster tower, Mr Asinelli must have been very proud of his erection. It’s thought that there could have been a hundred of towers at one time, now only twenty or so remain.
The smaller Garisenda tower is 47 metres tall and has a pronounced lean caused by subsidence.
The Caffe Zamboni near the foot of the tower offered any cocktail and a buffet dinner for ten euros, which was a good deal. It wasn’t cordon bleu (or the Italian equivalent), but it was quick and convenient. I had my first Aperol Spritz, and a damned fine drink it is too! It is an aperitif made of Aperol (a type of orangy vermouth), prosecco and a splash of soda water. The place was full of students who were just as pleased as we were to get a cocktail and as much food as you can eat for ten euros.
timharnesstravels 