Traveling with kids to Italy is always a treat, and Bergamo and Verona were no exception. Gelato multiple times a day, pizza, and (for the parent) red wine and pasta? Yes please! By lunch time on day 1 of the trip, despite the exhaustion of traveling solo with two young kids (5 and 2), I was in food heaven and so pleased I’d chosen to end the summer holidays in Italy.
Ahead of my trip to Bergamo and Verona, I didn’t dedicate much time to pre-trip media consumption (like I had done for Germany recently). Verona seems to be mentioned in passing and Bergamo not at all in what I looked at. I finished Henry James’s Italian Hours (that man loves his art), dipped into Charles Dickens’s Pictures from Italy (a much smoother read), and had an enjoyable time watching Letters to Juliet — also very nostalgic and reminiscent of a bygone era now, and lovely nonetheless. Post-trip, I treated myself to the easy-to-read Letters to Juliet, which predates the film, and explores the history of Romeo & Juliet in Verona.
Day 0: 6 transfers before gelato in Bergamo
We had spent the summer in my husband’s hometown in North Yorkshire, in an area which happens to be impossible to get to. To fly to Bergamo, we had to take one bus, three trains, one airplane, and one bus. Phew. It all went fairly smoothly with my husband dropping us off after transfer 3 as he headed back home. This was my toddler’s first time flying with his own seat. For the most part, he was awesome! A very calm traveler – until he realised he hated the seatbelt and freaked out during landing (both flights).
We flew through passport control and it was much easier traveling only with carry-ons — my preferred method of travel, with only a baby carrier and no stroller. My 5-year-old had his own rucksack which he did really well with. We got on the bus quickly and (the baby giggling with excitement at getting his own bus seat) within 25 minutes we were at the base of the old town in Bergamo, getting gelato! Delicious!
As this was the end of a 6 week summer holiday, I was pretty much out of parenting mode and we might have had gelato multiple times a day…
Our hotel was the Hotel Excelsior Bergamo, which I would not recommend. It was moderately convenient (for the airport / station bus and funicular). Everything worked OK. But for a 4-star hotel the reception staff were remarkably unkind. They never helped with my bags and they completely ignored my children. Except at checkout, they actually yelled at my toddler for standing on the lobby sofa. Not OK. Also, when you see a mum traveling alone with a huge rucksack and baby carrier you’d think at least to ask if she needs a taxi, right?
For anyone going to Bergamo, I recommend finding a place to stay in the old town (Città Alta) itself. Bus 1 goes straight there and it would save a lot of time when you’re sightseeing around town.
Day 1: In which food heaven is reached
If I had only come for this day, the trip would have been a success. Food! The food was so good! We headed out to the funicular (for the experience — it actually would have been simpler to take the bus) and I quickly realised that yes, Italy in summer is hot. We had a fan and lots of water but the only way to really deal with the heat is to make sure you’re under shade or inside as much as possible.
Our first stop was a museum that had an exhibition I wanted to see — the Convento di San Francesco which houses the Museo della Fotografia Sestini and Bergamo 900. The latter is an awesome, interactive depiction of Bergamo and its history. My son really enjoyed the gamefied way they walk you through Bergamo’s key buildings.
The photography exhibition featured work by a local photographer from the turn of the 19th century — just my kind of thing! I enjoyed wandering through the exhibit and the kids enjoyed running around (a theme on this trip; them running like crazy and me trying like crazy to get them to calm down).
Then I headed to the Natural Sciences Museum, a treat for my son who is currently prehistory-obsessed. Success. He loved it, and it was very kid-friendly. Usually it includes a ticket to the archaeology museum next, which I had been wanting to see, but this was closed.
The walk around the old town was fun, although it was so hot that we were trying to get to places quickly. There is a shady playground behind this museum that I recommend taking a rest in, maybe bringing snacks to enjoy. I was too hungry so we headed to lunch after they’d played for only a few minutes.
My (one) diary entry from this trip encapsulates my rapture pretty thoroughly:
So many hills! The green, plush, sun-beaten Italian views are a balm for me. I feast on it, looking around, observing the old cracked buildings with their old frescoes and old passageways. Bergamo is more touristy than I imagined it would be. I have to remind myself it’s the middle of summer, and that it is a budget airport within 15min, but somehow I thought people would skip it and go straight to Milan. I’m finding Bergamo much more meaningful, however.
We only have 2 nights here so it’s mainly about going up, up to the old town: I took a funicular for the sake of it and we’ll do the more convenient bus on the way back after M’s nap. I also need to eat again. It’s the whole objective of being in Italy, after all. After we had traipsed through the heat-packed upper city, and I’d treated them to stracciatella and mango gelato (the former being a speciality of Bergamo, the latter E’s selection), and we’d done two lovely museums — a really well done photography / history of Bergamo exhibition at the convent, and a natural history museum which wow-ed E with its giant woolly mammoth at the entrance – after that, I gave them 5 minutes in a shaded playground, vaguely considering whether I would do the sensible thing and buy some pizza focaccia (which looked delicious) to eat in the delicious shade there with them.
But. I’m here for food. And I wanted pasta. And I found the most amazing trattoria with a jaw-dropping view over the hills, and the pasta! I had chilled red wine, polenta (another speciality of the area), tagliatelle with truffles, and a salad. €40 and the kids didn’t eat a bite but it was worth it. If food was the goal, that’s my quest completed. It reminds me that despite the ridiculousness of taking two fussy young kids to a nice restaurant — and the stress of dealing with them and their nagging and their antics and the other restaurant-goers looking back at us like ‘what?’ – it reminds me of the importance of making space for the things that matter to me on these trips. Is it hard? Yes! But is it worth it? Usually it is. In balance.
And I did make the sensible choice of heading back to the hotel for M’s (very forced) nap as a siesta, whilst E is happily relegated to the bathroom watching his iPad.
Next up: I’d like to enjoy the upper city more, find more amazing food, maybe another gelato, and bask in being Italy some more.
The restaurant is called Antica Trattoria La Colombina. It is wonderful. Go.
The main thing we missed out on in Bergamo are the old city walls, which we couldn’t face as we were too exhausted after dinner (we had pizza and pasta overlooking one of the main squares). But we definitely got a feel for the scale of the town with its huge hills and windy roads and beautiful views.
We had the tourist city transport day pass, valid for 24hrs, which costs 4.90 EUR and works for all the transport we took around town. It was super handy and I was also able to use it the next day to take our bus back to the station.
Day 2: Boiling hot in Peschiera del Garda
This was one of those days where someone would look at me and go, ‘Why is she doing this to herself?’ Yes, sometimes I ask this as well, although not about going in the first place. I’m genuinely happy and fulfilled going on these trips with my kids solo, and I expect them to be difficult. It’s a trade-off that I value and think it’s worth it. But days like this, I do end up thinking I could make things a bit easier or plan a bit better!
It started off with a confused hunt to the train platform at Bergamo Station, which is currently under construction. We were lucky we’d gotten there so early — not something I usually do — as all the signs were confused and the platform was actually like a 10min walk from the station. The train ride to Peschiera del Garda itself was fine; we transferred in Breschia, got a taste of the high-speed train for 20min. This was fun! Did you know they give you drinks and a whole packet of food + colouring for the kids on these trains?
Now, it was already noon by the time we arrived and at this point the heat was just exhausting. Maybe I should have stored our bags somewhere (there are no lockers at the station, but it seems like you can use peer-to-peer storage if you search online). Or maybe I should have given up and taken taxis from the start. But I looked at the 8min walk to the restaurant and thought we could do it. It was hot! Hotter than Bergamo. We had a great lunch but the kids were a bit crazy and that in itself also takes energy. Then I let my son have a gelato, which was delicious, but probably did him in.
After the 5min walk to the gelato, we had 12min to get to a playpark + cafe (Il Kiosko Panoramic Bar) that I wanted to chill at with the kids. That walk was so hard! We had our rucksacks with us, the heat is staggering, my toddler can’t really be trusted to walk on his own without dawdling or doing stupid things on the road, and my five-year-old was just overheated.
We finally got to the cafe and the toddler loved it. He immediately ran to the playground, befriended another 2-year-old, and I was able to let him just play on his own. This despite his nap time being hours earlier. My 5-year-old, on the other hand, was so tired he just slurped up some juice and looked miserable until he began to play about an hour later.
The view as beautiful, and I felt like there was so much more we could do in Lake Garda, but we didn’t have the energy to do anything! Perhaps we could have taken a taxi to the beach area, but I didn’t see the point given we were so tired. I think the answer is simply this: don’t do Lake Garda if it’s super hot out and you have no base.
So, we took a taxi back to the station (also not timed too well since we had 45min to wait for the train), did some fun photobooth photos but other than that just waited in an overheated waiting room. Oh well. Lake Garda was pretty! I would like to come back one day.
But our day wasn’t over yet. Verona is only 20min away by train from Peschiera del Garda, which is easy enough. And the hotel I chose (I’d really gone back and over whether or not to get a nicer hotel) was very convenient, just 9min from the station, and they’d do an early breakfast bag for us since we had to checkout at 6:30am in two days.
But. It turns out I booked the wrong hotel! So we walked all the way over there in the heat, exhausted, and it turned out we still had another 13min walk to go. I was so shattered. I started doing stupid things at this point, like accidentally booking an Uber I hadn’t meant to book, and not even to the right address. Oops. We weren’t miserable, really, or in a bad mood, but simply exhausted.
So we tramped over to our hotel, finally checked in, I moaned a bit about how in the middle of nowhere we were (20min walk to the station… 25min to any of the sights… so annoying!). And then I decided that, whatever, we were taking taxis for the rest of the trip. I was so tired, it was so hot, and if we could make things that little bit easier it would be worth it. Some people are nervous about doing this since you can’t book taxis with carseats, but within the city I feel like this is generally an acceptable thing to do. It’s really up to you. But yes, in general, I choose public transport when traveling with my kids.
I did see that our hotel, Hotel Porto Palio, was relatively close to an off-the-beaten-track church that is traditionally considered where Romeo and Juliet got married. I didn’t feel like going in, but it was a nice square to go see after we’d had a quick dinner.
Many places in Italy open later for dinner (after 7pm), but it was not too hard to find somewhere to eat at earlier with my kids. The bonus to this is that it means the restaurants are not that busy when we arrive and I can relax a bit because my kids do tend to go crazy. I will let them wander around and make noise if there’s no one there, or if there are other kids there — something my husband hates dealing with, haha. I got around this in Germany by mainly eating at casual places, but in Italy I am here for the food! So I did not prioritise casual eateries here and went all out on going to the slightly-stressful trattorias with two kids.
Anyway, after the heat of the day had faded, we headed over to the square of the Church of Santo Zeno. My kids chased pigeons and ran around with the other Italian kids. It was lovely!
Day 3: A day in Verona with kids
Our last day dawned, and I was firmly in the taxi camp at this point. We got out pretty early, around 9am, and headed to the tiptop of Verona – the Castle San Pietro – where you can see sprawling views of the city and hills. It didn’t feel as dramatic as Bergamo, as you’re much more in a city, but it is a calm, beautiful way to start the day. There were a few other tourists there that early, but the funicular doesn’t run yet so it was very quiet.
We traipsed down towards the archaeology museum. I had meant to make a pitstop at a playpark, but we couldn’t figure out how to enter it! It didn’t matter, though — this walk downhill was one of my favourite parts of Verona.
So we arrived at the museum a bit early, they played with the bicycle parking (anything is a playground for kids), and we entered at 10am on the dot.
Such a great museum. It’s set in the old Roman theatre, which still houses performances, with its original seating, and you climb up the steps to an old church full of archaeological relics. The staff were very kind. One lady insisted on carrying my baby up the last two flights of stairs when she saw me arrive panting (and not knowing there was a lift!).
At this point it was obvious we were going to binge on gelato before our trip ended, and so we went to Q.B. Gelato. This was my fav gelato of the whole trip. I had the dark chocolate (mmmm). I was a sweaty, gelato-y mess and it wasn’t even 11am yet — the baby spilling ice cream all over us, us trying to eat everything without it melting everywhere. But we were so happy as we walked across the Ponte Pietra.
Now commenced, however, some exhaustion. It was too early for lunch (and we’d just had so much ice cream), so I thought we could wander through the city to see the main sites — Juliet’s balcony, and some pretty squares. But the thing is, it’s just too hot. We walked slowly around, and did some fun shopping, but the baby was exhausted and started throwing a tantrum (in a toy store, which is a pretty good place for a tantrum, all things told).
We ended up in a square where I was able to calm M enough for us to stop for lunch. More pasta. Yes, please.
We wandered to Piazza Bra, which is where the Coliseum-esque arena is, with a lot more ice cream (yes I let E have 3 scoops), and then headed back to the hotel for a rest. Baby had already napped in the carrier whilst I gorged on ice cream. And for dinner, I took them to an enclosed playground at Arsenale— great to sittervise for as long as one needs.
It’s conveniently set right next to the bridge across from Castelvecchio, a famous medieval art museum we didn’t get time to see on this trip.
So that’s it, that was our trip. We got to the airport at 6:40am the next day to head back home. Was it exhausting? Yes. Would I do it again? YES.
