Easter sunrise in Bologna

I saw pink clouds forming around 5:40 a.m., threw on my coat and covered as much ground as I could. Met a couple of other early risers with cameras and exchanged polite nods. Considering how overrun the city was with tourists on Saturday, this little stroll felt great.

Via Marchesana.

Via San Felice.

The view toward i colli bolognesi, the hills just south of the city.

Via Castiglione.

Via Valdonica, in the Ghetto.

Fountain of Neptune.

Sea nymph at the fountain's base. How very Italian.

Palazzo Communale.

Church of Santa Stefano. Got lucky with this shot.

Church of Saints Bartolomeo and Gaetano, next to the leaning towers.

Back in the Pratello, an early morning Mass concludes at the San Francesco Church. I observed. Didn't hear any reference to the Sri Lanka attacks.

After a two-and-a-half-hour walk and as if on cue, church bells reluctantly run out of steam outside my apartment. Happy Easter, everyone. I'm going back to bed.

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Renato DAll'Ara Stadium

Great atmosphere, just a 30-minute walk from the Pratello, and hey, it's quality Serie A football. Fans of the visiting team are kept in a literal cage for their protection. Vendors in the city can be found here (enter "Emilia Romagna" as your region). I got my ticket at L'Occitane Voyages at Via Della Lame 2. Bring your passport. Your name is printed on your ticket so you'll also need some kind of identification at the stadium. The Rosso e Blu fell behind, then boat-raced Empoli in the second half, with all four goals coming right in front of me. On the way home, every scooter on Via Costa tooted its horn.

Bar De Marchi

My slender experiences in Italy lead me to believe that the word "bar" signals that a place serves coffee and snacks, and that it also happens to pour wine, beer and aperitifs. This chill pub on Piazza San Francesco got my business today. It is gearing up for a big Liberation Day party coming up Thursday to celebrate the collapse of Fascist rule and the end of the Nazi occupation. Sounds like a simple victory lap in a neighborhood rife with antifa-friendly graffiti, but maybe not. Takeaway alcohol sales have been banned on April 25 previously, so maybe things have gotten out of control, not sure. Motorists in the Pratello are warned that all traffic will be prohibited, and even bicyclists in the neighborhood are advised to vacate the racks. Don't know what that will accomplish or where they’re supposed to put their bikes. On a sunny day, Bar De Marchi is a great place for a cold Pignoletto or a Campari spritz. If you order a birra, they’ll pour you a Dolimiti Pi...

Bologna's towers

They built them to be closer to the heavens or further from the muck of the street. To scan for marauders coming over the Appenine Mountains or to one-up the Joneses next door. Craning your neck at the Piazza di Porta Ravegnana, one can appreciate all of these hypotheses. What we do know is that a field of slender four-sided monoliths once reached toward the sky here and that one of them, the Torre Garisenda, was the subject of verses in Dante's "Inferno." Clouds floating in the opposite direction of the tower's tilt created the impression it was about to crash into the ground, the poet remarked. The lines are inscribed at the base of the tower, which was taller in Dante's time. For safety's sake, it was shortened in the 1350s. The Torre Garisenda is a tale of survival. Until recently it was thought that as many as 180 such torri existed in the city, which inspired conjectural drawings like the one below and, in turn, lazy headline writers to des...

336 hours in Bologna

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