Bolzano

Bolzano is located in the north of Italy in the province of Bolzano-Bozen and rests at the base of the Alps. My Italian friend, Antonella, when told that we planned a stop in Bolzano said, "Bolzano is not Italian; it's German." And she was right.

Signs were posted in German first then Italian. Upon entering a shop, I was addressed in German (of course, I look nothing like the Italians do so perhaps this why). We walked through the town's markets and visited Oetzi, the iceman, in nearby Tyrol.

Normally, I'm not taken with Natural History Museums, but Oetzi was fascinating. So many of his possessions had been beautifully preserved by the glacier. Because visualization is so important to me in terms of enjoying an exhibit, I think that was the appeal of the Oetzi exhibit.

Littlest was anxious to see his body on display. There was a small opening, a window, which was quite high up on the wall; however, there was a knob that could be turned which raised the silver platform in front of the window. Littlest did this easily and wasn't startled by the 5,300 year old brown-tinged, leathery mummy. Bop was hesitant to look upon him though she eventually relented. Like Bop, I was startled at how close his body was to the window. I had expected to look upon him from a distance and was unprepared to look at his leg which was six inches from the window. Log and J enjoyed looking at the items found near to Oetzi like his hunting bow, flints and tools.

After touring the museum, we walked through the market and bought roasted chestnuts which are ubiquitous throughout Europe at this time of year. We also sampled parmesan that was made locally. We bought quite a slab of the cheese (it's so good that you can eat the cheese without any accompaniment because the nutty tang is just that delectable).

The town itself owed much of its appeal to the majestic mountains.