Northern Tour- Day 5

After a restful night's sleep in my own private hotel room, I get up early in the morning for the 45 minute bus ride into Genova for the day. There are obvious signs of the rain showers that were passing through all night long, and now the storm clouds threaten to rain upon the morning as well.

Driving along the coastal cliff sides, I can see from the bus window these dark clouds over the ocean. The clouds themselves are displaying some beautiful contrasts in color and shade, and a temporary break in the clouds allows the sun to suddenly burst through in magnificent rays of light, highlighting a spot of the ocean below as if God himself is touching the water and making it holy. This rare scene along the coast was so beautiful that it had everyone on the bus completely entranced. One girls behind me, upon waking up from a short nap could barely believe what she saw before her, just laughing and saying that it was "too ridiculously beautiful to be real."

view of Genova from the top of this weird "elevator" thing we went on.

Genova, which one of the major port cities in Italy, is also home to the largest aquarium in Europe and, looking for a different experience today, we all decide that this is one opportunity that we cannot pass up. It was cool, and I really enjoyed watching the dolphins and penguins, but I think that I have definitely been to at least one or two bigger aquariums in the US. Plus, I accidently mis-read my watch and got out of there a good 45 minutes earlier than I had to, and could not get back in because we were not issued actual tickets. So instead I went to this glass shirical greenhouse called the "Biosphere" and sketched for a while. Luckily, since I was the only one in there for a while, I got to go in for free and was able to do whatever I wanted. 

One of my favorite sights of the day was when we got a special tour of the Teatro Carlo Felice, which is Genova's theater and opera house. This is the most complex stage set up I have ever seen. The ceiling is 100ft high from the stage and the floor is 100ft below the the stage, which allows for immensely complex scenes to be raised and lowered throughout the performance, on 3 by 5ft panels that can move together as a whole or individually move up and down, or even pivot in any direction. I got to see workers building the set for the next Opera to be shown there and was amazed by the depth and precision they go through to make a stage set that will just be torn back down into scraps after a few performances.

After a full day of touring we head back on the bus to our hotel in Varazze.
Some rainy weather has once again left this place in a blanket of fog, rising and moving along the mountains as if some magical force were acting upon them.

Of course! I say to myself.

This is the place where clouds are born! Why didn't I realize this before? It seems so simple now, that a place which has captured the hearts and imaginations of artists and writers for centuries would also be a nursery of the sea and sky.

Back in Varazze I have a lot of preparing to do. This was actually the last day of the official tour and tomorrow we are all (minus Ezio, Tom and Susan Mills, and the bus) going to take a train from Genova to Cinque Terre for a weekend of mountain trails, cliff diving, swimming and hiking.