Corso Porta Borsari has changed a great deal over the years. I am not sure when this happened but the area from Piazza Erbe to Porta Borsari is now a pedestrian only area and has become a very high end shopping district competing with or exceeding the likes of Via Mazzini. A great deal of custom jewelers and designer shops of international caliber line the cobblestone way.
Side streets hide well stocked bookstores, nice shops and restaurants. At the end of one of these side streets clearly a church (that I am not familiar with) has been turned into a pizzeria! This is the second one I know of in Verona ... what is happening??
Just like any Saturday night, a lot of people are out this Saturday night. They are sporting their best wears, they are strolling, and shopping, and chatting, and laughing, and eating, and shopping, and chatting, and shopping... The Melegatti store is crouded, the lights are shining on the Bauli Christmas tree.
Looking up you can see the interior of luxury apartments above the fashionable stores, their ceilings adorned with vibrant frescoes. This is the old rich Verona, this is where the younger population has come to retake the family prestige, living in their patrician Verona.
Via Oberman cosses over and connects Piazza Bra to Porta Borsari and continues onto Ponte Garibaldi, one of the newer bridges over the river Adige. Via Oberman, just as I remember it from years ago, houses quality art galleries and some nice eating places. The Astra movie theater is still in Via Oberman, I remember going to the movies there with my friends as a teenager in the 70s.
With most, but not all of the market booths from St. Lucy gone, an ice skating ring has been set up in Piazza Bra and a younger croud has clearly taken over the place. Lights, lights, lights, and then more lights. On Christmas trees, on buildings lit up in well designed compositions of color, lights strung over streets, lights everywhere. And then the Star, the overwhelming structure visible from the entire Piazza.
With snow on the ground and breaths steaming, it does not feel cold at all.
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