Catholic Church

Bergamo and Verona

Posted on by roundtheworldkid
Under Juliet's Balcony
Under Juliet’s Balcony
Bergamo - Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
Bergamo – Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
Bergamo Cathedral
Bergamo Cathedral

I got out of the car. My family and I saw a great big church. We went inside and saw arches, columns and vaults inside. I could tell this was Romanesque. It was very big. Very, very big. By the time we got out, we went into another church. This one was Baroque. It was made out of white marble. It had lots of pictures about stories from the bible. They used these pictures to learn bible stories, since most people at that time were illiterate. We headed out, and we started walking around. We saw a lot in the narrow alleyways. We saw a Pinocchio thing and some old buildings. When we got back, we saw a guy playing “Hotel California” by the Eagles on his guitar. His version didn’t have words. As we got on the road to Verona again, I asked Dad to put that song on the radio. I didn’t think I’d ever request that!

Verona
Verona

The next day, we woke up early to see Verona. We had already returned our rental car. We got out and starting walking around again. We climbed a hill and looked at the view. There was a castle on top of the hill, but we didn’t see it. When we got back down, we saw a big Romanesque church. This one was not half as big as the one in Bergamo. After that we found a nice café to eat “breakfast” in. The reason we couldn’t find a good place to have a decent breakfast in was because Italians don’t really have breakfast ( you may already know that ). Then we walked around and found Piazza delle Erba. There we found a small art gallery and people could bring their dogs inside! Dogs are allowed almost everywhere in Italy.

Verona Pano

Then we walked to the arena, but on the way we had a chocolate break. The arena almost looked like a small version of the Colosseum in Rome, but they use it as a theater! Isn’t that cool?!? I love it when people do something like that. After that, we went to Juliet’s balcony. It was built in the 20th century totally as a tourist attractions. It was overcrowded with many, many, many young couples. It was not even worth going there. After that we had another chocolate break. This time it had fruit, too. Finally we went to Giardino Giusti. My favorite part was the hedge maze. I also liked the turtles. There were at least 10 of them in one fountain! Too bad they weren’t Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles!

Verona – Watching Turtles
Verona – Turtles
Verona – Giardino Giusti
Verona – Gardens – Maze
Chocolate break!

To Bellagio and Beyond!

Posted on by roundtheworldkid
Bellagio
Bellagio, Italy

One day we went hiking in the forest in San Bartolomeo, which is a tiny village in Northern Italy. We collected lots of chestnuts! Our inspiration for this was that we saw a man collecting chestnuts. We filled our pockets with them, and we ended up having eight pockets full of chestnuts. They were really tricky to get because they came in pods that were super spiky. We found lots of big ones, even two huge chestnuts. We had a great time. We ended up giving them to our friends at our AirBnB Apartment. I didn’t know that hiking could be so fun!

Hatfull of chestnuts
I was pretty tired.

The next day we went to Bellagio and it was so amazing. I thought I was in Disney Animation Studios. It is just so beautiful. You have the lake, then the mountains in the background. The water is so clear that you can see straight down to the bottom. We walked among the many narrow alleyways cutting through the town. At one time we stumbled upon a café and I had a glass of hot cocoa. My parents had some coffee. Then we kept walking among the narrow alleyways. At one point we explored some gardens. After that I had some gelato. Yum yum!

Super-clear water!
DESSERT!!
Now do you see how narrow the pathways were?
Gotta say…some GOOD hot chocolate!

As I told you, we stayed in a AirBnB Apartment. The owners of the AirBnB apartment had two kids: a 3-year-old named Jimmy and a 10-year-old named Jessie. I enjoyed playing board games with them. We played “Crazy Monopoly”, which is just like regular Monopoly, but you make up the numbers and whatever’s on the Community Chest and Chance cards. That was very fun. I also played “Guess the Code” with Jessie. Once she even guessed my code in one try!

James, Jimmy, Jessie
Me with Jimmy and Jessie

“This church is round. Are you kidding me?” I asked.
Columns circled the inside of the building. They supported small arches that held up the building. Each level up they got smaller and smaller. It was all made of stone. I was told that the church had been built from 1150 – 1180 A.D. This was during the Romanesque period. Next we saw a complex of three churches that were built into one. The first part of the church was a Renaissance building that was built in the 1500s A.D. Its arches were much bigger than the ones inside the round church. Through a doorway we found a 9th century church. This place was more like the round church. It was rectangular, though, and had thicker columns that were the shape of the building itself. The next level contained a 7th century crypt that was much smaller and more closed than any other building we had seen. We exited and next we saw a church that was built in the 1100s A.D. Inside were many frescos that were used to teach bible stories, because reading and writing was too rare. The pews had been replaced by pop-up chairs for cleaning. A whale bone was on one of the arches. During the building of the church, workers found it in the ground.
As we left, we were given rosaries, medallions, and bracelets. We got back in the car and drove to our AirBnB apartment.

I said, ” The medallion actually warms me up. ”

The nice man that gace us our gifts at San Giorgio
I can climb a tree!
Whoa! Those are some tall arches!