Visitors to Italy always make a bee-line from Bologna to Venice, thereby missing out some of the country’s most exquisite towns en route. Padova is increasingly recognised as a worthy neighbour to ‘La Serenissima’, especially with regard to its Giotto frescoes, Saint Anthony’s tomb and the fascinating historical centre. We described Padova (Padua in our post at https://longoio.wordpress.com/2014/05/11/why-dont-all-bankers-behave-like-this/ et sequitur.

To the south of Padua are the lovely Euganean hills sung by Shelley in the midst of which is the house where Petrarch lived his last days. This is also described in my post at https://longoio2.wordpress.com/2017/04/30/italys-second-prize-winner-for-best-village/

There’s a lot more to feast the eye if one wanders a few miles off the Ferrara- Padua autostrada. One of the places we looked at was Monselice described by the great American transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson in his journal of 1833 as

the most picturesque town I have seen in Italy. It has an old ruin of a castle upon the hill and thence commands a beautiful and extraordinary view. It lies in the wide plain – a dead level – whereon Ferrara, Bologna, Rovigo, Este, Padua stand and even Venice we could dimly see in the horizon rising with her tiara of proud towers. What a walk and what a wide delightful picture. To Venice 38 miles.

We didn’t actually walk to Venice – our little Panda car took care of that nor were we able to climb the castle as all we stopped at Monselice for was for a bite to eat – singularly unsuccessfully as there wasn’t a place open! All closed for the holidays… However, we could easily see why Emerson loved the place. The town’s almost deserted streets with little porticoes shading one from the relentless noon-day sun were supremely picturesque. Monselice surely deserves a lot more time than we gave to it. Next time we’ll want to climb to the top of the castle keep crowning a perfect volcanic hill and appreciate the view that so enthralled Emerson. We shall also visit one of Europe’s finest armoury collections at the Castello Cini, the Romanesque church of Santa Giustinia, the Seven Churches Sanctuary by Palladio’s pupil, Scamozzi, with paintings by Palma il Giovane and also the Villa Duodo another of Scamozzi’s most original works.

However, we were keen to fill our stomachs and our recent peregrinations took us to two further towns, Este and Montagnana, which completely magicked us – but that must take up another post or two to describe those quite astonishing places.