I’ve been meaning to visit Brescia for a long time as it’s one of the few major cities in the north that I haven’t been to. This area is quite an industrial part of Italy but the city still has a hietorcal centre and is surrounded by hills to the north and east.
It was another gorgous sunmy day so decided to go for a walk up into the hills behind my host, Paolo’s house.
I ended up walking for a good 3 hours, much longer than expected but the path was easy (once I’d climbed the hill!), the weather good and I had some great views over the city. Being able to snap the Duomo and castle together was quite lucky…
From the bottom, the hill looks like nothing but going up was hard work. I was down to my t-shirt soon enough. The path I took went behind the hill where it’s just woodlands; quite a contrast to the built-up city side.
After a stop back at Paolo’s house for lunch and to sort my laundry out, I wrapped up again and made my way towards the castle.
Built on top of another hill overlooking the city, the castle turned out to be a lot larger than I expected.
I spent a good hour and a bit wandering around, enjoying the sun and the views. I don’t know if I was supposed to pay – no one else seemed to be stopping at the ticket office on my way in – but there seemed an awful lot to see for free. Oh well!
As the sun was starting to set, I took a wander down to the histoical part of the city before it went dark. On the way down I got a lovely pic of the Duomo.
I don’t know why this city isn’t on the tourist route (I shouldn’t complain!) because the historical centre is gorgeous. Lots of winding streets and mis-matched buildings surround the main squares and, with the Christmas lights, it has a really speical feeling.
I found the large Piazza Duomo which has the contrasting old and new cathedrals next to each other. So different in style both inside and out they were a great visual showing not only how old the city really is but also the fantastic developments in architecture.
From inside, the new cathedral was so vast and imposing but had a strange ’empty’ feeling too; like there was simply too much space.
While the old cathedeal felt like a step back to the Medieval time: most of the building is below ground level and the central open space is supported by huge stone arches. It was hard to take a good picture because of the shape but I had a go.
By the time I came out the sun had set and the city had a different feel again, all lit up.
By now I was getting pretty chilly so took a brisk walk back to the house. Paolo wasn’t home from work until after 8pm so I had a couple hours to sit, drink tea and warm up before dinner.
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