Bologna / Modena (Italy)

Bologna: Italy’s Food Capital

Well, we wrapped up our time in Tuscany, hopped on the train from Lucca, and moved our base of operations to Bologna for a full week.

If you’ve never been to Bologna, the energy here is fantastic.  It’s a vibrant, youthful university town that completely comes alive once the sun goes down.  It also happens to be the ultimate culinary launchpad.  From here, you can easily take quick day trips to nearby food meccas like Modena (the birthplace of real balsamic vinegar) and Parma (home to true Parmigiano Reggiano and Parma ham). You know we couldn’t resist a setup like that.

The $100 Vinegar Heist

While exploring Modena, we booked ourselves onto a proper balsamic vinegar tour.  Talk about an eye-opener.  It turns out the “balsamic” most of us grew up buying in supermarkets back home is complete BS—it’s usually just cheap white wine vinegar packed with added sugar and coloring.

Real traditional balsamic is an art form.  After the tasting, we decided to embrace the “flashpacker” lifestyle and dropped $100 on a single, precious bottle of 25-year-old traditional balsamic that had been aged in cherry wood barrels.

So, did I enjoy this $100 balsamic vinegar that I just splurged on?  I barely even got to taste the damn thing.  Barbie absolutely polished it off before our week in Bologna was even over.  I actually caught her red-handed in the kitchen late at night, straight-up drinking teaspoons of this liquid gold like it was cough syrup.  I can’t even blame her—the stuff is pure magic.

Biking & Walking Around Bologna

One of our absolute favorite parts about exploring these Italian cities is that you genuinely do not need a car.  In fact, you don’t want one.  Every city we visited was incredibly walkable, packed with pedestrian-only streets.

Even better, you rarely have to worry about getting plowed over by a rogue vehicle.  Italy enforces strict ZTL zones (Zona a Traffico Limitato), which completely bans outside traffic from entering the historic city centers unless you’re a local with a permit.

Because of that limited traffic, getting around Bologna was an absolute pleasure.  We fell in love with their electric bike-sharing system called RideMovi.  You just download the app on your iPhone, scan the QR code on a nearby e-bike, and off you go, breezing through the medieval streets with zero effort.

And trust me, we needed the exercise.  We ate our absolute asses off in every single city.  Luckily, we managed to clock at least five miles of walking every day, scouting out sights and restaurants, which helped burn off the endless mountain of pasta, deli meats, steak, and gelato calories.

On To Sicily

Our time on mainland Italy has officially run out.  Next up, we’re keeping it humble and flying the ultimate aviation cattle car—Ryanair—down to Palermo, Sicily.

We’ve got a massive seven-week road trip lined up to circle the entire island of Sicily, where we plan on digging deep into some serious history and channel our inner Michael Corleone.  We’ve heard the food culture down south is a completely different animal compared to the north, and we are more than ready to start eating our way through it.