If you’ve time pop over to Venice’s neighbour
First of all, a promise. After this week’s particular indulgence, this page will remain an Italy free zone for a while but, before I face withdrawal, I have to tell you about Padua. Not just about Padua as a place to visit, but Padua as an example of how, when things are on our doorsteps, we so often simply overlook them.
As regular readers will know, I have an enduring love affair with Venice. I have been visiting two or three times a year for 22 years. I’m here at the moment, on an extended sojourn, and enjoying every minute of it. I’ve now experienced Halloween here for the first time, and, last weekend, the festival of San Martino which falls on November 11. Celebrated throughout Italy, it is, for some reason, a particularly big deal in Venice.
So last Saturday afternoon, as I made my way ‘home’ after seeing two friends off on the bus back to the airport, I witnessed the local children take to the streets, carrying saucepans, or just saucepan lids, and battering them like crazy with spoons and other implements as they wandered through their local districts, singing the San Martino song in the hope of accumulating ‘goodies’ for themselves, just like Halloween.
When I’ve been here before on my own I have used the brilliant Italian train network to whisk myself away for the odd day to different places, just to experience somewhere I’ve never been before. So last year I saw Verona for the first time. And wonderful Bologna. And I’ve ‘done’ Milan in the past in the same way – out of Venice Santa Lucia station on a morning train, back in the evening.
Last Sunday I finally made it to Padua – or, Padova, as the Italians call it. I have stopped in that station en route to somewhere else so many times and yet I’d never seen the city.
As I strolled back to the station with darkness falling on Sunday evening after wandering around Padua for a few hours, I was trying to work out why, with all the time that my late husband and I had spent in Venice, we had never taken the 25-minute train ride to this glorious city. Yes, 25 minutes, and that’s if you opt for one of the ‘Regionale’ trains. On an intercity it can be even faster – although more expensive, of course. My Regionale journey cost me the precise sum of €4.15 each way.
I didn’t spend that long in Padua for this first visit. I only decided to go after 11.30am on Sunday. But by 12.15 I was buying my tickets at the machine in Santa Lucia and at 12.40 the train left, bang on time, for Padua. If you arrive there by train, it’s about a 15/20 minute walk to the centre – to the old, historic part. Don’t be disheartened by that walk. Well, do you know many cities where the streetscape in and around the train station is a thing of beauty?
But once you hit Piazza Cavour you know you are in the heart of this historic city. There stands the famous Caffe Pedrocchi, dating from the 18th century. It’s bigger than I expected and has the advantage of being both a café and a restaurant. An expensive Sunday Brunch was on the menu last weekend (€38 a head) but you can also just pop in for a coffee and a pastry if that’s your preference.
Looking right or left off the main thoroughfare I was intrigued by the vista – ancient streets leading tantalising to other ancient streets, some just with little local shops, others with household (Zara, H&M) or designer (Prada, Louis Vuitton) names on view.
I went straight to what is known as Il Santo, the 13th century Basilica of St Anthony, a massive imposing edifice and the city’s main ecclesiastical attraction although, bizarrely, not the cathedral. A place of great devotion – St Anthony’s remains are here, and five million people visit the basilica every year – it is very beautiful, if somewhat OTT inside. (The cathedral, the Duomo, is much plainer.) From Il Santo I strolled the short distance to Prato della Valle. I’d read that this is the largest square in Europe and couldn’t quite believe that. Well, so much for my doubts. It is massive – almost 89,000 sqm – and only slightly smaller than Moscow’s Red Square. It’s also beautiful, with a park in the middle and, last weekend, a profusion of autumn-coloured trees.
Other highlights? The ancient Palazzo della Ragione and the lovely Piazza dei Signori with its trademark clocktower.
I didn’t make it this time to the 12th century Scrovegni Chapel with its famous Giotto frescoes. But I’ll be back. Indeed, with a lovely city like Padua now ‘discovered’ on my Venetian doorstep, maybe even this week. ÷Listen in on Thursdays as Ros talks Travel with Ivan Yates on the Hard Shoulder, Newstalk 106108fm, 4pm-7pm.