Massimo is an old friend. He lived in our Grassroots community neighborhood for a few years while teaching Italian at Florida State, and we have managed to get together with him on every visit to Northern Italy. We decided to meet in Vicenza ,which is my top pick for a day trip from Venice.

It was a beautiful cool clear morning as we walked to the train station, which was and not very crowded on this weekday. The coffee place at the station suits me fine. The ride to Vicenza was only 47 minutes and we met Massimo outside on his arrival so I could stand in the sun. We talked and walked and strolled and chatted. We had another coffee and bathroom break and I shot Massimo coming out of the bar for his fans:

We looked at the duomo and talked about archtecture:

We enjoyed the main Piazza and the elegant Palladian architecture:

I got to do a lot more window shopping in the nearly empty streets than in Venice, where it is a major crime to stop the flow of foot traffic.

I liked this new modern fountain and its playful attitude:

Righetti is a cafeteria style restaurant of which I have fond memories from our last visit here in 2014. We went there for lunch. It wasn’t nearly as wonderful as my memory, but we had a great, inexpensive lunch, accompanied with a side of non-stop conversation.

We walked some more after lunch, and had yet another coffee in the piazza before walking back to the train to say goodbye to sweet Massimo:

Getting off the train in Venice, I knew we needed groceries so we stocked up at the Despar. It was really heavy to carry all the groceries home!

And then, I never cooked dinner. Ken had cereal and I snacked on taralli. Oh well.