San Marino from Ravenna – Day 2 – April 2
We were to have Silvia for our guide again today, but due to
a change in the laws only citizens of San Marino can lead tours unless one
isn’t available. She did check in during the day to see how things were going.
We had a larger group today, we were joined by Bob & Phyllis, Roberta &
John, Heather & Matt, Cathy & Tom, June, Horst & Mark and a friend
of theirs Nicole. As always, a great group to spend the day with.
San Marino is the 5th smallest country in the world and the
3rd smallest in Europe is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The ancient republic
sits high in Italy's Central Apennines Mountains. San Marino is a mountainous
microstate surrounded by north-central Italy. Among the world’s oldest
republics, it retains much of its historic architecture. On the slopes of Monte
Titano sits the capital, also called San Marino, known for its medieval walled
old town and a maize of hilly & narrow cobblestone streets. The Three
Towers, castle-like citadels dating to the 11th century, sit atop Titano’s
neighboring peaks. From the guard towers and the piazzas, the views over the
surrounding countryside are jaw-dropping.
We had about the same drive time today to reach San Marino. We
met our guide Andrea who spent 2 hours showing us the town and then we had a
couple hours of free time to have lunch and shop or wander. He was humorous and
very informative and proud of his country. We really felt like we had stepped
into a fairytale.
The people who live here are NOT Italians (they are referred
to as Sammarinese).
Our walk was dotted with cafes and shops of all kinds. We
came to Basilica di San Marino which is a Catholic church. Today is Palm Sunday
and we saw many people coming out of the Basilica carrying olive branches. The
difficulty of procuring palms in unfavorable climates led to the substitution
of branches of native trees such as olive, as we saw them carrying out today.
We couldn’t pop in to see the church since services had just let out and there
were many people still inside. He said it was a simple church and not grand
inside.
We stopped at an overlook before continuing on to the towers. Lots of inclines today!
The Guaita is the oldest of the three towers, and the most famous. It was constructed in the 11th century and served briefly as a prison. It was rebuilt numerous times and reached its current form in the 15th century during the war fought between San Marino and the House of Malatesta.
The second Tower is the Cesta which is located on the highest of Monte Titano's summits. It was constructed in the 13th century on the remains of an older Roman fort.
The third Tower is the Montale which is located on the smallest of Monte Titano's summits. Unlike the other towers, this one is not open to the public. It was constructed in the 14th century. It is thought to have been constructed to give protection against the increasing power of the Malatesta family in that region. It was also used as a prison, and accordingly, the only entrance to the tower is a door about seven meters from ground level, which was common for prison architecture of the time. Andrea left us here for our free time to walk back anyway we wanted to have lunch and shop or visit any other sites.
From everywhere there were awesome views of Rimini, the town below and the Adriatic Sea.
We had a nice lunch at Ristorante il Bolognese, a restaurant that Andrea recommended, and Heather said that other people on the cruise ate there the day before and said it was very good. Everything was hand-made in house and generous portions. We ordered the 4 cheese & truffle bread which was to die for and to our surprise they also brought their “bread/tortilla/pizza crust” with 2 different toppings. Also, very good and if we’d known they were bringing that we could have skipped the truffle bread. I got the Gnocchi Mascarpone Gorgonzola and Greg got the Gnocchi al Salmone. We were first to arrive and first to order, but last to get our food. I think it wasn’t premade and took longer to serve. It was worth the wait, and I couldn’t finish mine, try as I might.
We skipped staying in town as we wanted to just get caught up on a few things before our next 3 ports.
We went to dinner at the buffet and overheard some women
complaining that their tours had been canceled and were talking about high
winds and bad weather. We had checked the weather for the next 2 ports and
while cold we didn’t see any storm concerns.
On our way to the evening entertainment the Captain came on
and announced that due to winds in the Adriatic Sea we would need to skip our
next 2 ports. (Slovenia & Croatia) Also, we were spending the night here in
Ravenna and would stay until noon tomorrow. If we had known that we would have
stayed in town, but with an early start in the morning we didn’t want to be out
too late. We could go into town at 8:00 tomorrow and arrive at 8:30 and then
leave on the 10:30 shuttle for the 11:00 all aboard, but not sure that would be
worth it for an early morning short visit.
So, disappointed to have 2 more ports canceled on this
cruise. One tour guide I had been working with since 2021 and he hung in there
with each canceled world cruise said he felt badly after all that we had to
cancel the tour.
We went to the evening entertainment, which was a comedian,
Greg Schwen. He was very funny and understood his audience. He even said people
like you don’t need to hear first time cruise jokes and referred to how long we
had been on the ship. Just a lot of human nature kind of stories. He is used to
doing comedy shows for corporations in all fields, so he is capable of fine
tuning his comedy to his audience, unlike so many of the ones we have seen that
we have seen on numerous cruises, and they are doing the exact same show.
After that we came back to the cabin to deal with our tour
cancelations. We are still trying to get refunds for San Juan del Sur that was
canceled very early on. (maybe even before we got on) and Darwin who has had
one excuse after another for not paying us our refund and even blamed us for
all the trouble he was having refunding us.
Tomorrow, we will treat as a Sea Day and the next day now
will also be a Sea Day. Hopefully, we will visit Kotor, Montenegro. We have
been there before, but we had not been to Slovenia (new country for us) or
Split in Croatia. Lots of other ports in Croatia, but not Split. So, missed the
2 places we hadn’t been to and probably will get the next 2 where we have
previously visited. And so it goes…..
It was hard to understand the Captain’s logic of the winds
will nothing but get worse, so we stayed overnight to wait for it to get worse?
San Marino https://photos.app.goo.gl/JR1YndrbvdzFpmK86
Of course, there were birds:
Eurasian Blackbird
Eurasian Blue Tit
Eurasian Collared-Dove
European Greenfinch
European Serin
Hooded Crow
Italian Sparrow
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