Aarsen family travel adventures: Italy

Italy - Day 2, History and drama were the themes of the day. We decided to visit the historical city of Trento, for you history buffs, this is where the council of Trent was held between 1545 and 1563 by the Roman Catholic church to refute what it defined as heresies committed by proponents of the Reformation. This city was supposedly an easy 50-minute drive however our navigational aids did not adequately inform us of the width or condition of the roads. So instead of a cruisy country drive we endured the windiest and narrowest drive imaginable, and in a wide van this was somewhat of a challenge, things didn’t improve when we got to Trento as there was nowhere, it seemed, to park our van. We finally found a parking spot that would fit us thirty minutes’ walk from our destination “Castello del Buonconsiglio”. This castle was built in the 13th century and also home to some amazing paintings from the 15th & 16th centuries, even the children were impressed by the oil paintings, particularly how the artists managed to capture light and paint faces, fabrics and lace. The Castle is also renowned for its Fresco Paintings, of which we had a short audio tour in the tower this was not only informative of the paintings themselves but also life in the 13th and 14th century.

Our drive home was not much of an improvement and our wonderful navigational aid decided that the morning’s drive could be improved upon (!) by sending us on a tiki tour that doubled our travel time back home. Thankfully the children had a series of audio books by James Herriot to listen to, while Dad meandered in and out of mountain passes and windy and precarious hill climbs trying to avoid oncoming cars and the occasional truck and tractors, Mum meanwhile was hanging on to the edge of her seat as she had to endure windy and narrow roads whilst trying to figure out which turn to take next.

What was particularly memorable were the little towns that hung precariously to the hill sides, and the roads so narrow through these towns that if you opened a front door it would be knocked off by a passing vehicle!

This is just one of twelve 14^th century fresco’s that depict the life of nobles and peasants through the months of the year, these frescoes gave us a detailed picture of what life was like at that time. On an interesting note - the nobles were always painted larger than the peasants, no matter where they were in the painting, as a peasant could never be pictured larger than a noble.

A selection of fresco's through out the castle, note the date.

One of the Paintings on display by “Giovanni Battista Lamponi” Photos can never provide the depth and warmness that is found in a well painted oil painting.