La Dolce Vita in Italia (Bologna)

I arrived in Bologna, Italy via train last Wednesday evening (9 September) and since then have eaten the most incredible meal I’ve ever tasted, gone for gelato far too many times, climbed the Duomo in Florence, taken pictures on the Ponte Rialto in Venice, and spoken lots and lots of Italian.

The train ride from Paris to Bologna was long, but entertaining. For the first few hours of the trip, everyone was speaking French. The guards who came by every few stops to check passports and train tickets all spoke French, and I responded “Merci.” After about 4 hours, we went through a long 40 minute tunnel and made our first stop in Italy immediately. Suddenly, everyone on the train spoke Italian, and when the guards came by to check our passports, I now responded, “Grazie.”

While in Italy, I am staying with our good family friends, the Caruso’s, who live in Bologna. We spent my first few days in Bologna preparing for and celebrating Ale’s 11th birthday. We went shopping for food, stuffed the piñata, decorated the garden and the cake, and made mini pizzas (from scratch!). In between preparing for the party, Laura and I saw a movie in Italian at a one screen movie theater (it was an old-fashioned theater—one where they change the movie once a week and there was an intermission in the middle of the movie), ate the best gelato in Bologna at Il Gelato di Fini, walked dogs from the pound, and went swimming.

Ale’s party was last Thursday night and everyone had a great time. Ale’s friends and their parents are all very international—one of the mom’s is married to a German, another mom speaks Spanish, and another mom is from Madrid. I have to say that speaking Spanish in Italy was great fun. That night Ale’s friend Martina slept over and the three of us watched the Hannah Montana Movie in Italian.

The next day, Ale’s actual birthday, was unbelievably and unexpectedly fun. We woke up early to go to a theme park near Bologna called Mirabilandia—a mix between Great America and Disneyland. We met Martina’s parents and little sister Beatrice at the park and went inside. I hadn’t been to a theme park in maybe 10 years, and I’m not a huge fan of big roller coasters, so I was a little nervous, but also excited. We ended up going on pretty calm rides and had a blast. Coincidentally, we saw two sets of cousins at the theme park. The first group of cousins just stopped by to say hi, but the second group of cousins joined us and we spent the rest of the day with them! Letizia, the cousin closest to Ale’s age, kept speaking to me in Italy and I loved it!

We left Mirabilandia around 5:30 and drove to the beach for dinner—a night and a meal I will never ever forget. The beach was in a town called Punta Marina not far from the theme park. When we got there, we went in to say hello to the owners of the restaurant, who the Caruso’s know. Max, one of the owners, is a professional volleyball player when summer ends and his sister was the captain of the Olympic Italian volleyball team. Max’s mom is also one of the cooks for the restaurant. After saying hi to everyone and ordering our food, Ale, Martina and I went swimming in the “bay.” It was like the ocean, but much warmer. We played in the waves for about an hour and by the time we were done, dinner was ready.

The food was FANTASTIC—hands down the best meal I have ever tasted. When we ordered our food earlier, I didn’t know what to get because everything was fish, so Paul and Laura ordered for me. I wasn’t sure what to expect because I am somewhat new to eating fish. The result was more than I ever could have expected—spaghetti with 7 different types of fish: shrimp (gamberetti), prawns (gamberoni), crab (cranchio), clams (gongole), muscles (cozze), scampi, and conochie. At the table we were speaking a mix of Italian, Spanish and English (Martina and Bea’s parents speak Spanish) and enjoying an unforgettable meal. For dessert we had homemade crepes filled with jam and nutella. After dinner, Martina, Ale, Paul and I played beach volleyball for a while before going home. It was an incredible night and one that words could never justly describe.

The next day I went to Ale’s softball game and then we went into downtown Bologna. We climbed to the top of the tower for a view of the city and then climbed to the Church of San Luca—a beautiful, hilltop church that you can see from almost everywhere in Bologna.

Skipping ahead a few days, my last night in Bologna was yesterday. After getting home from Venice, we went out to dinner at a delicious, local restaurant in Bologna for some traditional Bolognese food. Then we went for my last gelato in Italy…for a while at least.

So that was my trip to Bologna in a nutshell. THANK YOU Caruso family for letting me stay with you—I had a wonderful time with you all. Still to come—blogs about my trips to Florence and Venice. Ciao!