Tom drove us to the train station in Sulmona where we had time for a coffee before boarding the “Jazz” train to Pescara:

In Pescara, we saw a “Pop” train. Marketing? And then we boarded the Frecciarossa for Bologna.

The ride from Sulmona to Pescara, to the east was passing beautiful snow topped mountains and greening meadows. From Pescara, we followed the coast up to Rimini and it mostly looked like this:

We walked from the train station to our apartment for these three days and got a very hurried orientation to this space. I chose this apartment because of the balcony with a great view. It did not disappoint:

We set out on a nice wandering walk to see if we could remember much from our last visit 12 years ago. We found the Piazza Maggiore which was strangely full of law enforcement vehicles. There were lots of police and cars of all kinds on blue carpets. Also, there were lots of families with kids checking it all out. I liked these two, who were way too cool for this assignment:

We continued our wander, stopped in a Tamburini market where things did not look as enticing as I remember.

Finally, we stopped in at the Mercato di Mezzo (Middle Market), which is like a small food hall. Ken got a spritz and I got a glass of Franciacorta and some erbazzone:

Neither one of us was really hungry after that, so we wandered towards our place and stopped in for gelato. This was really great gelato! I had pistacchio and some mix of hazelnut and chocolate shards. Ken had mango and dark chocolate. We sat on a bench outside the shop and people watched while we indulged. Bologna really has a college town feel to it. And just like many prime tourist destinations, when you walk 2 or 3 blocks from the “big sites” you are surrounded by real life and I love it. Just like I love gelato for dinner!

We did a very minimal grocery shopping and came home. We feel like we are starting a new vacation, post covid, and this is a great beginning!