May 2020 – for 8 days (Tentative May 16-24)LEC Study-Trip to Italy is part of an Italian Studies Course (4 credits)

Veneto – Emilia-Romagna – Trentino-Alto Adige On this trip 5 World UNESCO Heritage Sites

- Borghetto sul Mincio- Peschiera del Garda - Sirmione - Verona- Venice- Trento and Mount Baldo. - Dolomites, San Candido village & lake Di Braies- Ferrara - Ravenna

Total cost $3,000 (airfare, hotel, breakfast, dinners, private bus, boat/ferry tours, cultural activities/museums included).

First deposit: $200 due in September, non refundable. (by September 19, 2019) Seats are limited. Priority for the best students in Italian Studies.

Departure from Cleveland airport, arrival in Milan (Italy) on the following day. First stop on the way to Peschiera del Garda in Borghetto sul Mincio that is one of those places that seem unreal. Like a fairy tale. You arrive here crossing the Visconteo bridge and you discover a tiny village basically lying on the Mincio river, a perfect place for a romantic getaway: stone houses, some ancient watermills, the view of on the melancholic ruins of the medieval bridge and the medieval castle appearing among the trees on the hill. They claim to have the best tortellini!

Arrival in Peschiera del Garda, our hotel is here. Peschiera offers its visitors visible signs of every historical era through which it has lived: from the age of pile-dwellers (stilt-house inhabitants) during the Roman Age, and from the early to late Medieval years in which the Scala Family ruled, to the Venetian era, then the Napoleonic Empire, to the Hapsburg rule, when Peschiera was one of the four fortresses of the Austrian Quadrilatero, at the time the most powerful defensive system in Italy, and finally to the Italian Risorgimento (1800s). Today its historic center, with its shops, cafes, restaurants…. is a great place for shoppers and foodies. It is completely enclosed in high Venetian walls, a buffer between the town and the waters that circle it completely and that endow it with its pentagonal form. It is completely enclosed in high Venetian walls, a buffer between the town and the waters that circle it completely and that endow it with its pentagonal form.

Second day in Italy: boat tour to Sirmione, an elegant resort town on the southern edge of Lake Garda that has attracted vacation-goers for centuries. We will visit the 13th-century Scaligero Castle and the Roman ruins of the Grotte di Catullo, students can also enjoy the lake’s crystal-clear waters, the amazing thermal baths, shopping, a gelato……

Third day in Italy: Trip to Trento and to to Monte Baldo by cable car (a mountain range in the Alps) for a spectacular view of lake Garda and a nice walk on the mount Baldo!

Trento city lies in a wide glacial valley called the Adige valley just south of the Alps foothill range Dolomite Mountains. It is known for its architectural and historical gems, including Buonconsiglio Castle and Trento Cathedral. We will visit both of them.

Fourth day: trip to Venice. Few cities can claim such a priceless art, music and history heritage as Venice. This unique city with its magical, spectacular scenery is not just beautiful; it is a real miracle of creative genius, an engineering miracle: a city built on mud, on water. It is a UNESCO world heritage site

Fifth day in Italy trip to Ferrara and to Ravenna. Ferrara shines with the former glory of its Renaissance past. A stroll or bike ride past remarkably intact castles and defensive walls makes it say to see how this northern Italian gem scored UNESCO World Heritage status. Second stop in Ravenna that has been the capital of the Western Roman Empire, the capital of the Ostrogothic kingdom, and the center of the Byzantine Exarchate of Italy. Ravenna is connected to the Adriatic sea by the Candiano canal. It is known for its well-preserved late Roman and Byzantine mosaics and architecture, with eight buildings comprising the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Early Christian Monuments of Ravenna".

Sixth day: discovering the Dolomites, San Candido village and the breathtaking lake di Braies. The site of the Dolomites comprises a mountain range in the northern Italian Alps, numbering 18 peaks which rise to above 3,000 meters. It features some of the most beautiful mountain landscapes, with vertical walls, sheer cliffs and a high density of narrow, deep and long valleys. This site – a UNESCO world heritage site - contains beautiful lakes and an internationally important combination of earth science values. The quantity and concentration of highly varied limestone formations is extraordinary in a global context, whilst the superbly exposed geology provides an insight into the recovery of marine life in the Triassic period.

Seventh day: trip to Verona. Best known for its Shakespeare associations, Verona attracts a multinational gaggle of tourists to its pretty piazzas and knot of lanes, most in search of Romeo & Juliet, love.... But beyond the heart-shaped kitsch and Renaissance romance, Verona is a bustling center, its heart dominated by a mammoth, remarkably well-preserved 1st-century amphitheater, the venue for the city's annual summer opera festival. Add to that countless churches, a couple of architecturally fascinating bridges over the Adige, regional wine and food from the Veneto hinterland and some impressive art. The city is a UNESCO world heritage site.

Eighth day: departure early in the morning from Peschiera del Garda to Milan Airport. Fly back to Cleveland most probably with Delta Airlines.