Let’s continue our adventure discovering Bologna and what it offers to touriss of all age, especially youngsters and students. First of all, how to reach Bologna? Guglielmo Marconi International airport is just outside the city. By car, due to its central position in the map of Italy, Bologna is well-connected to North and South-East of peninsula. By train it can be easily reached from everywhere. With new Freccia Rossa trains, Milano is just one hour distant and Florence only thirty minutes.
If you love Formula 1 Championship you can’t miss Imola: the most famous Italian race track is just 15 km away from Bologna. Furthermore Imola retains a medieval fortress and other spectacoular monuments. It divides Emilia from Romagna, both part of the same region, whose capital is Bologna. But if you prefer Moto Gp, Bologna hosts, in Borgo Panigale, Ducati.
Emilia-Romagna is worldly known for its cuisine and recipes. Specialties like Bolognese Ragù and tortellini stuffed with prosciutto, mortadella, chopped veal and parmesan cheese. Other famous dishes are lasagne and many are the recipes with pork, like sausages, the Bolognese cutlet with ham, cheese and truffles and ciccioli. This city mixes mountain and rural flavours, as it is situated at the foot of the Apennines, at the borders of Pianura Padana, italian’s biggest lowlands.
Famous throughout the country is the great market in Montagnola (hillock), held every Friday and Saturday from the morning till the late afternoon, near the small hill and the square, Piazza August VIII. There is a market with local artisans and artists, the ethnic market and the used clothes one, where you can do good business. Then the big square with clothes, fabrics, household products, where people crowded to catch the latest offers.
Around Bologna is a hive of bars, shops, clubs and places to spend an hour free in the open air, chatting with friends immersed in a very particular scenario. If it rains, no problem! A dense network of ancient lodges protects yourself, where ou can meet and walk without getting wet.
Since ancient times, Bologna has been a crossing point for scholars, prelates and merchants from all over the world. Still nowadays it retains the appearance of a multiethnic city, where you can meet people from all over Italy and a large community of Maghreb, Chinese, Albanians, Indians, Pakistani people.
There are many festivals dedicated to theater, contemporary art and music. Here big and small orchestras pass, in a full program of events, meetings, laboratories, really rich for a medium sized city.
If you love jazz the right places are Chet Baker Jazz Club, Cantina Bentivoglio, Osteria del Moretto and Bar Wolf. For everything concerning rock music, songwriters and electronic music Estragon, Tpo, Link, Kindergarten, Cassero, Sottotetto are the preferred locations. To find disco music you have to go to Le Scuderie, Ruvido, Matis. This are only my advices as the list could be very long to mention place of interest for nightlige in Bologna.
Image Flickr creative commons license, courtesy by: dvdbramhall