la pratellina

we arrive in ravenna (via bologna) on the 11th and... adorable! ravenna is adorable! also, hugely devoid of tourists. so lovely. there are free yellow bikes that anyone can ride, but we decide that our ears cannot handle the biting wind. another time, indeed.

the stone streets in the historic area have differently colored stones in the center to denote the bike lane. so friendly! small lanes and wonderfully walkable. little planters on the roadsides have rosemary bushes that smell delightful.

our hotel is santa maria in foris. gorgeous. amazing. the beds aren't super comfy, but the bathroom faucets are strange brutal ducks with faux gold gilting and the room itself is large and spacious. plus, we get delicious chocolates on our pillows.

we have dinner and head out to walk around the town. jen hankers for some cigarettes and buys some from a vending machine. she realizes too late that the machine doesn't give exact change and is then forced to feed it more money and buy some candies and 2-3 bottles of water to not lose precious euro (exchange rate not as sucky as the pound, but still rather high).

the next day we warm up and savor cappuccinos and pastries at a coffee shop. we meander about the town and take lots of lovely photographs of mosaics, the basilica san vitale and the mausoleo galla placidia. much time is spent in the museo nazionale as well (no photographs allowed!).

we have a swoon worthy dinner at la rusticello, recommended by a somewhat brusque shopkeeper down the street from the restaurant (she softened up a little when we practiced our painful italian on her). the owner (?) would come out of the kitchen with a little apron on while stirring a dish of tortellini and gave us glasses of prosecco after our meal. :D

damn, italy rawks.

{jen and i got to see yen cranky here. she was so hungry and therefore grumpy when we weren't serviced right away, it was so funny! we laughed about it once we finished a carafe of wine.}

our last day in ravenna, jen made some phone calls in the room while yen & i went to dante's tomb (jen had already seen it). the only bad was that the museum was closed, so i was unable to really "learn" anything. which would have been nice, so we could have understood what we were looking at. alas!

a run to 2 socks stores (italian women seriously love their socks and stockings) and we were off to florence.