on to trento

After two days in Venice, Rick and I went to Trent to take up our new friends' offer to come and visit the Italian Alpine region. Of course, a day and a half in Trento is insufficient to truly appreciate it. I did however appreciate the quietness of the town after coming from both London and Venice. We arrived in Trent in the early afternoon, while most people and stores are in siesta. While waiting for our hosts, whose names we did not know at this time (and likewise, they did not know our names!), we decided to walk around the town a little. It's a quiet town hugged by mountains, bearing a mix of medieval, gothic and renaissance architecture. Trent is rich in history, being site for the 16th C Catholic counter reformation movement (Council of Trent) and used to be part of Austria in the 19th C, then becoming part of Italy.

We met up with our excellent hosts and they took us for dinner that night. They opened their homes to us, all the while neither party knowing each other's names (at least not until the following day when we were getting ready to leave). We stayed in Trent for one night before we headed to Cinque Terre, through Verona.



Trent's historical centre is a car free zone, so instead of seeing businesspeople in suits driving BMWs, we saw businessmen with a cigarette in one hand, bike handle in the other, pedalling through Trent in their silk suits.




Rick and I were waiting for our hosts by the baroque Neptune Fountain (above and below) in the Piazza del Duomo. The piazza is right in the historical centre and is claimed to be one of the most beautiful piazzas in Italy. The buildings surrounding the fountain were the Cathedral of San Vigilio, the Palazzo Pretorio, the Torre Civica (which was built in 1200 on the ruins of a Roman gate), and the Palazzo Balduini (dating back to the 15th C).



These are our generous hosts (below). One of the most memorable things about the trip was this couple's generosity. All it took was for Rick to offer his seat on the bus, and we end up in this beautiful town, sharing such a wonderful moment with strangers.



This is a picture of the Torre Verde (below), which is a medieval tower built to defend the port on the river Adige. Where the road is today used to be where the river Adige flowed before it was diverted in the mid 19th C (talk about advanced technology!). This is a place where ships loaded with goods and where tolls were paid to the prince-bishop, but according to our host, this was also the tower where 'bad christians' were thrown off as a means of execution for such hideous crimes such as not going to church...



Here's the view of Trent from the the Castello delo Buonconsiglio, which was one of the more interesting castles I've been to. It has a mish mash of architecture, with different wings built in phases.

The selling point for me deciding to take their offer and hop on a train to Trent is something our host said - apparently it was in Trent (in this castle) in the 13th C where it was decided that women have souls (although I haven't found anything to support this). Now how's that for historical significance.





Trent is definitely one of the most beautiful surprises of our trip. Enjoy these pictures as they are the last digital pictures we were able to take. From Verona on, we were relying on our yellow disposable camera. I'll post those pictures once I see them and get them digitised.