My husband and I will be setting up base for 7 days in Bologna in late Ocotober. I've been there a few times but only for a day or two and it was a very long time ago. Can anyone suggest which area or neighborhood to get a place? Typically I like to stay in the historic center or somewhere within very close proximity to the main drag where the locals take passeggiata. However, I have no idea where this is. I know Piazza Maggiore is the considered the historic center, but I can't for the life of me even remember what that area was like. Last time we were there we stayed on campus at the university which is not my preferrence now that I'm much older. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Also, we will be doing a tour of Emilia Romagna from our base in Bologna so if anyone has any "gems not to be missed", please, please pass them on! I'm a southern Italy/Sicily afficianado, so I'm in uncharted territory and totally out of my element! THANKS A MILLION!

Info on Bologna can be tough to find, so I'm bumping this for you. I will also be in Bologna in late October, but I haven't been before so I can't be much help.

My understanding so far is that the city center (near Piazza Maggiore) is the best place to stay due to its proximity to transportation, restaurants, shopping, etc. Besides exploring the city itself, I definitely plan to take day trips to Parma, Modena and Ravenna.

I'm sure others could provide more insight.

I had a lot of trouble finding any guide-type info on the city. My suggestion is to search on this site for trip report to Bologna. Maybe people can post the links to some on this thread. The city center is quite small and P. Maggiore is the center. You should also consider hopping on a train for a quick day trip to Modena and Parma. They can shrink-wrap some Parmegiano Reggiano (sp?)in Parma that will keep for months. I will try to provide a link or from previous posts as well.

topped my Bologna report for you - the link was too long and would have messed up the forum bar

Was there for a few days in February and posted this report:

http://fodors.com/forums/threadselec...p;tid=34954110

The portion on Bologna and Ravenna begins about halfway down, on March 1st postings.

Excellent!~ Thanks for the trip reports, I can't wait to read them tonight, I might have some questions when I'm done. Does anyone know what the weather is like in late october?

Hello GuiliaPiraino, I would pack a few articles of clothing in case it is cold and/or rainy. Wearing some kind of outwear on the plane is a good idea so that it does not take up room in your luggage. A twin sweater set or two (that will fit under your outwear) is good as they are so versatile.

Do make your hotel reservation as soon as you can. I have never been able to find a vacant room in Bologna as I have always waiting to long and every time there was a Trade Show in Bologna which meant no rooms were available.

My Bologna trip report can be found on http://www.iol.ie/~draoi/

bm

Here's your report, Carte Pisana, and I don't think it will mess up the formatting here:
http://fodors.com/forums/threadselec...p;tid=34922487

Hello,
Has anyone toured the castles in the Parma province? Is a rental car needed to visit these castles? Thanks.

Here's the bit I wrote about Bologna and a side trip to Parma in January:

We arrived to a much colder and slower Bologna. Before leaving the Bologna train station, we went ahead and purchased our tickets to Zurich since there were specific trains I wanted to be on.

Took a taxi to Albergo Drappiere, 6 euro. The hotel is cute, up a flight of stairs to the front desk. The room is 85 euro a night including breakfast. If you choose not to eat there, let them know and they will remove 10 euro from your bill. One thing negative I have to mention about our room (401), it smelled of sewer gas…especially the bathroom. It was bad and I usually complain immediately about things like this, but we decided not to and kept the bathroom window open. Did I mention how cold it was outside? Also the shower was so tiny that if you drop something you have to pick it up with your toes..and forget about shaving your legs!
The hotel is on via Drappiere which is a beautiful pedestrian street with markets spilling out of almost every doorway. Beautiful and colorful fruit, flowers, vegetables and even seafood. All of that is immediately in your face as you exit the hotel. We are also 2 doors down from the famous Tamberini, with proscuitto de parma hanging all around and loads of fresh pasta and other foods ready to take home and warm up.

I have to warn you that M and I did all of our homework for Rome and barely read a thing about Bologna. I did search for a guidebook just on Bologna but found none. As we walked around we felt like complete strangers in this beautiful city, not really understanding what it was showing us. So, no more facts and figures going through my mind as I look at churches and monumental buildings and towers. We didn’t even have a map of the city ahead of time. We bought one at the train station for 7 euro.

First lesson regarding food in Bologna…make reservations for dinner. We tried several places that were recommended but we just weren’t on our game.

We wandered slowly around this seemingly sleepy town (compared to Rome) and around 1:30p we stopped in at Ristorante Teressina. I ordered Tagliatelle alla Bolognese and M had tortellini en brodo and we shared a plate of mixed grilled vegetable plate. With wine, the total was 43 euro. The ragu Bolognese was very good. Restaurants are more expensive in the city center, as well as the shopping so be prepared. In Rome, that meal would have been about10 euro less.

The city is extremely beautiful and walkable. The porticos the line most of the streets go on forever and most are painted or decorative in different ways. The window shopping is top notch and top prices. You have to go out of the center to find stores with item you can afford (at least what I can afford). The beautiful 16th century Neptune fountain by Flanders-born Jean Boulogne or Giovanni Bologna was exciting. He also sculpted the Rape of the Sabine women that you can see in the Piazza della Signoria in Florence.

Next door to the hotel is “Gilberto”. A wonderful shop that has been in the Gilberto family since 1905. Stefano, grandson of the founder, showed us around the shop and when M expressed an interest in buying a bottle of wine Stefano took us down to the wine cellar. There was a large and extensive wine collection from every single region in Italy. Upstairs they have grappa, etc and all things alcoholic as well as pesto and jarred spiced pears, olive oil etc. So many yummy and lovely things. The also have a wide selection of chocolates, biscotti and nuts. A virtual general store specializing in those lusciously bad habits. We picked up a bottle of Thea 2004 from Emilia Romano region, 17e. Stefano said it was excellent and we agree. I loved that store and was sad to think I could not pack my carry on with some of those tempting jarred items.

For dinner, we followed a Fodor’s suggestion about eating at Tamborini’s enoteca to get a sampling of the local meats and cheeses. Once ordered, they bring out a large round wooden plate full of 5 or 6 different kinds of thinly shaved meats and several cheeses. Far more than the 2 of us could eat and we tried. It was all delicious. I had my pad and paper out to ask the waiter again the name of everything on the plate but he never came back to check on us…too bad. Bill w/ beer and bread – 20 euro. One thing we went crazy over was a spicy sauce that was drizzled over the pecorino romano cheese. It was red and had a definite hot pepper kick to it…really good. It turned out to be mustardo di peperoncino. It was sold in small jars at Tamborini, about 4-6 oz jar for 12.90 euro. Wrapped in bubble wrap I brought, it was kept snug in my checked luggage.

As we exited the enoteca around 8:30pm we noticed that most of the shops, excluding clothes stores, were closing. There were still plenty of bars and restaurants open as most people were just starting their happy hour and snacking before their real dinner. Keep in mind that if you go into a bar and order a glass of wine or beer between about 6p-9p you will get something to munch on. It can range from plain potato chips and peanuts to a sampling of salmon sandwiches and pizza. I offended the waitress by not eating what was placed before us and giving it back to her saying “Non Fame, grazie”. I knew that we would not be hungry for dinner if we ate that snack. We are continually astounded by the amount of food the Italians can eat. We have sat in restaurants completely starved and still found it impossible to always clean our plates…but not the Italians, they can really put it away.

Now back in the room, regrouping for tomorrow’s day trip to Parma. Tomorrow is our last day in Italy and now that the end is in site, we are starting to get homesick.


Jan 18

After the hotel breakfast of bread, butter and cappuccinos we took a cab to the train station and bought 2 tickets on the next regional train to Parma. Regional, so we didn’t have to make seat reservation and could hop off in Modena if we decided to. Modena is halfway between Bologna and Parma. Second class tickets, one way were 9.80 euro each.

We reached Parma, again not knowing the layout of the city we purchased a map in the train station shop. We found the city center and started walking. Our goal today – cheese. We came upon a lovely shop “Salumi e Formaggi” just a few blockes from the train stationin via Verdin, 6c (www.andreabaroni.com). The website may still be under construction. The owner was a young man named Andrea Baroni who spoke perfect English, French and German. What drew us to the shop were the wheels of Parm in the window and proscuitto hanging in the store. We asked a lot of questions and he was full of information about the different types of Parm and as we talked he would have off pieces of the Parmigiano for us to sample. This experience is exactly why we decided to go to Parma in the first place. We purchased a chunk of Parmigiano and he shrink-wrapped it for us. How exciting! M and I cook a lot and love to eat good Parmigiano, olives and wine while we’re preparing dinner, so this will be very special for us. We had a light lunch, nothing special about it except for M’s chocolate soufflé which was full of molten bittersweet chocolate. I’m not much of a sweets eater and almost got a stomach ache just looking at it. After lunch we wandered around about and then headed back to the train station and caught the next train back to Bologna. Very close to the larger park in the city center is a tourist information center. Next door is FREE internet access. We used it because the ATM refused M’s card and we feared the worst, so we found this place to check the balances of our accounts.

As we got back to the hotel in Bologna and started to settle in for a few minutes the phone rang. It was the receptionist at the hotel front desk asking if we had just left a cab; “yes” I said, well the driver found something in the backseat and he is here to return it to you. Can you believe it, again I left something in the backseat of the taxi and this time it was the parmigiano. I thanked him profusely for coming back to find us. What a kind man, what a forgetful girl I am.
For our last meal in Italy we scoped out Trattoria Gianni in Bologna because of a review of Fodor’s about it. When we spotted it earlier, we should have made reservations for that evening. As we entered the restaurant at about 8pm we were immediately asked if we had reservations…we were turned away. We settled on Ristorante da Carlo on via Marchesana, 6. (http://www.ristorantedacarlo.it/inglese/index.html) M had sliced beef in a Barolo reduction with grilled polenta and potatoes. I had small pork fillets in a balsamic vinegar reduction and some greens and potatoes. It was very good and you had to get used to the balsamic stinging your nose as you raised it to your mouth. With some sambuca to top off the meal, the bill was 40 euro.

CP's report is at
http://fodors.com/forums/threadselec...p;tid=34922487


The computer recognizes links to forum threads.

If that comment was for me, I thought she might not want to run thru many pages of Rome info to get to the wee bit of Bologna info.

no, that was for Carte Pisana. Ira didn't see that I'd already posted that link.

try the hotel roma in bologna. its right off the piazza maggiore on a small walking no car street great location, frieendly hotel with a fair breakfast

My husband and I stayed 4 nights here:
http://www.cosyhouse.co.uk/
when we were in Bologna last October for our honeymoon. Gabriella is the biggest sweetheart, and I would recommend anyone stay with her in a heartbeat.
Now, the apartment isn't quite in the historic center, I'd say it's a 15 minute walk to the Piazza and probably 20-25 to the train station. I personally like living more among the locals, and I certainly felt safe enough that walking back at night was no problem.

As for not to be missed gems, if you're going through E-R you HAVE to go to Ravenna, but I'm sure you already knew that . In Bologna, I'd say definitely eat a meal at Da Bertino, and take the hike to San Luca.

Hi!

Give a look to:

http://www.hostelworld.com/availabil...a-Bologna-8566

http://www.italymag.co.uk/accommodat...na/B%26B-ANNA/

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Rev...a_Romagna.html

To EJRossi: At Cozy House, was it an appartment or a guest room? For example, did it have a kitchenette and it's own bathroom? Bathtub or shower? I looked on the website and although it had lots of info, there wasn't much info on the actual rooms or even a photo except a very small thumbnail. I also like staying with the locals, that's my preference too, so the place looks appealing. Just curious if it has a kitchen. Sometimes we like to make our own meals or have breakfast in before heading out for the day. Or if during the off hours 1-4pm, we like to have food in our room. Just curious.

It's not a private apartment, it's a B&B in the owner's apartment. There was no kitchen available to us, but Gabriella makes a very nice breakfast every day.

The bathrooms are shared with whatever other guests are staying there at the time. We never had a problem as there are 2 full baths available, and there was only 1 other couple staying there 2 of the 4 nights.