Verona Tourist Traps

When we come to Verona, we spent more than two hours trying to find some good place to stay and park our car. Unfortunately, we had to do that very far away from the planned place. Even when you find some place to park, there are still problems because of italian miniatury style, so if you come with big car, you will lost most of your nerves on parking.

I have very strange experience with behaviour of people in Tourist Office at Railway statiton of Porta Nuova in Verona. I and my boyfriend came there, because we had to find some free accommodation for one night. Sounds like very easy thing, but not for this office.

Lady there gave us only catalogue of all hotels in Verona and said that we can choose, but she can´t recommand us, she can´t call to any of them, she can´t tell where in map are hotels...so it is service for who? Just giving catalogues and saying nothing? Really dont understand.

At the end one lady recommanded to us, to go to http://www.cav.vr.it/Inglese/
this is great office for all accommodation in Verona. We went there, got hotel in one minute in better price then is written of website of hotel.

So my advice is dont waste your time with ladies in Tourist office at Railway station. They "just" doing their job...

Juliets' balcony is of course just a bit of tourist fun. It is a medieval building and there is a balcony, but that;s about as close as it gets. There is a nice statue of Juliet in the courtyard and it is supposed to be lucky to rub her breast - tacky?

But it's fun to visit and timing is the key. We were lucky in that our hotel was only a steet away, so we visited before breakfast and there was no-one there but us. We wandered through the house which we had all to ourselves, and took pictures on the balcony, from the balcony and of the balcony.

We happened to pass by one afternoon and the place was heaving with tourists all shuffling up to rub Juliets breast and lean over the balcony. It looked like hell and to be avoided at all costs

Unique Suggestions: Get up early and beat the crowds.

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Verona-the Romance city (the second after Rome), here the Roman monuments (the Roman theatre, an arch and a gate, the bridge) are combined with monuments of the Middle Ages, Romance churchs and Gothic buildings (lock of Skaligers, Juliet's house and Romeo's house)... Look at my another photos ...

Verona-the romance city (second after Rome), here the Roman monuments (the Roman theatre, an arch and a gate, the bridge) are combined with monuments of the Middle Ages, Romance churchs and Gothic buildings (lock of Skaligers, Juliet's house and Romeo's house)... Look at the photos in other sections...

I have just travelled from Verona to Dublin and had a three hour wait in Verona airport before my flight.

Be warned that there is a serious lack of facilities for any comfort at all.

We were advised by our tour rep not to go through security until at least 40 minutes before our flight time and his reasoning for this was that there is a selection of shops and cafes to enjoy in the main departures area. Indeed there is, but the shops are very few and the cafes do not have the benefit of any seating areas.

There are a couple of seats in this area but they are choc a block with people who selfishly use some seats to park their luggage and stretch their legs across another couple. I was with tweo elderly ladies, one of those on crutches, and nobody offered either of them a seat.

Similarly when you go through security the waiting area at the flight gate is similarly crowded and I ended up sitting on a tabl, having to almost fight for a seat for my invalid Mother.

Unique Suggestions: To make the best of this bad situation, don't bother hoping to buy last minute gifts at the airport as there's little worth buying.

Stock up with cool drinks and a good book and make your way through security to your departure gate. At least you have a better chance of getting a seat plus there are toilet facilities there.

Paying to see "The Home of Juliet" is about as reasonable as paying to see the home where Clark Kent grew up, or where Sherlock Holmes lived. The wife of a person whose hobby was reading about Sherlock Holmes paid a small fortune for a pipe said to have belonged to the FICTIONAL detective. The husband graciously did not ridicule the wife nor laugh at her ingenuous naivety. In 1963, when I was through (quickly) Verona, most of the people paid little attention to the tourist value. Now that tourist dollars are important it seems that anything is for sale to the gullible.

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A house in Verona that has a balcony? Oh, in that case it must have been Juliet's house and that romantic foul Romeo must have climbed up to her. Hmmmmm its got tourist trap written all over it. In reality this house is actually a restored 13th century inn which has been renovated in recent years to, in my mind and many others, cash in on the tragic story of the two lovers from rival families that was originally written about by Luigi da Porto in 1524 before Mr Bill Shakespeare made it famous 60 years later.

As you enter from the narrow street into the small courtyard, you'll pass by a passageway that is littered with graffitti and love messages written on scraps of paper stuck to the walls with chewing gum. This "theme" is continued in the courtyard. So tacky is it (sorry for the pun) that a house that shares the courtyard has large signs warning people not to attempt to do the same on their property. Can you imagine what they have to live with? Can you live without visiting? Verona has a lot more to offer than you wasting your time here.