When we arrived, Verona was in the midst of a 2-day carnival honoring Santa Lucia, so with my Swedish roots I felt right at home. No sleepy women in flaming crowns serving sweetrolls here, but plenty of throngs in the streets and stands hawking the Italian version of beer nuts on every corner.

We ended up purchasing the beer nuts by accident, when we tried to ask what they were. Verona was a good place to practice our fledgling Italian. The language skills I'd picked up from listening to Italian at a Glance while driving to and from work were a start, but in the beginning I mostly recognized words after the fact, not when I actually needed them.

Verona has an old Roman arena (1st century AD) in the center of town, which like many Roman ruins in Italy is used for occasional concerts, tennis matches and other civic events. In the photo at top, you can see the arena on the right and the modern comet-like sculpture that now shoots out of it.

We hiked to the top of the hill shown above in the morning, saw the apparently derelict Castel S. Pietro, and had a great view of the town. In the foreground is the Adige River.