Verona day six: Bergamo

Bergamo - this is the place where the crime story takes place that we once read in the Italian language course: theft of an Etruscan necklace from the museum - since then I wanted to go there. I have a free weekend, Venice would have been the alternative but it's so touristy, it didn't really appeal to me. The old town of Bergamo, the upper town, perches on a hill, locally one of the southernmost foothills of the Alps, the new or lower town extends to its feet into the Po Valley.

6:30 a.m., my alarm clock rings. I bought a digital ticket from Verona to Bergamo online. Everything runs smoothly like in Switzerland, until I miss my train when changing trains in Treviglia: platforms are not displayed and by the time I found binario 2 Ouvest, the 5 minutes transfer time was over and the train was gone. Well, I wanted to have a coffee anyway. The train is like a suburban train, I just take the next one.

Bergamo is populated by black Africans in the area around the train station, you can easily get weed and other drugs, the local youth also buys it quite openly. But I am - despite being a German eco-slut - a Signora, so everything is easy. The Italian youth smokes openly on the street even more than I am used to from Germany.

The friendly lady at the tourist info tells me about buses, funiculars and Cittá Alta. Well, I can even walk to the two bus stops and the line at the cable car is longer than I am willing to endure at a ski resort, so I walk, it's only about 150 meters in altitude to San Vigilio in total.

The upper town is in full swing, exclusively Italian-speaking people squeeze through the narrow streets of the old town, in the restaurants and when enjoying the San Valentino menus. The residents of Bergamo, the 2020 sad world champion of Corona, obviously have the need to make up for everything they have missed because of covide diacannove. Many couples have a bottle of wine together for lunch, it is crowded like at Stachus (Munich expression for a very busy square) and the upcoming Valentine's Day adds to it: kissing and cuddling everywhere, taking couple selfies and holding hands.

You deserve it, Bergamasks.

and for the nerds:
the walls of the old town are now UNESCO World Cultural Heritage, they are almost 5 kilometers long and you can walk on them around the old town.