Veneto

Verona

A compact pink-marble city on the Adige, halfway between Milan and Venice, and the natural stop between them. In summer the Arena stages opera to fifteen thousand people on stone steps.

Arriving

Stations

Verona Porta Nuova

Fifteen minutes' walk to the Arena, or a short bus. All Frecce and regional trains.

From the airport

Villafranca, twenty minutes by shuttle bus to Porta Nuova.

Onward

Connections

To	Fastest	Operator	Reservation	Frequency
Venice	1h 10m	Frecciarossa	€13	Hourly
Milan	1h 10m	Frecciarossa	€13	Hourly
Bologna	50m	Frecciarossa	€13	Hourly
Munich	5h 15m	EuroCity	From €12	4 per day

Verona is the cheapest place in the north to break a Milan–Venice run: the regional between the three cities needs no reservation at all.

See

Worth your time

The Arena
A first-century amphitheatre still in nightly use every summer.
Castelvecchio
Carlo Scarpa's museum conversion is as good as the collection.
Torre dei Lamberti
Lift up, stairs down, the whole red-tiled city underneath.
Giardino Giusti
A Renaissance terraced garden across the river, almost always empty.

Eat

What to order

Risotto all'Amarone
Cooked in the local wine. Heavy, excellent, autumn food.
Bollito misto with pearà
A pepper and breadcrumb sauce found nowhere else.
Piazza delle Erbe cafés
Overpriced and worth it once, at the right hour.

Day trips

Where the trains go from here

Lake Garda (Peschiera)

15 minutes regional to Peschiera del Garda, pass valid, then ferries.

Mantua

45 minutes regional. Gonzaga palaces and a lake on three sides.

Vicenza

30 minutes regional, Palladio's home town.

Book ahead

Tickets and tours in Verona

The sights below sell timed entry that genuinely runs out. Booking links are affiliate links.

LandmarkFrom €35

Verona Arena opera tickets

Summer opera on Roman stone steps. Bring a cushion; the cheap seats are unpadded rock.

Check availability

Bookshelf

Read on the way to Verona

Three books that make the window, and the city at the end of it, more interesting. Links are Amazon affiliate links and cost you nothing extra.

Juliet's Answer

Glenn Dixon

The letters to Juliet, and the volunteers who reply to them.

The Merchant of Venice & Romeo and Juliet

William Shakespeare

Both Veneto plays in one volume, for the Arena interval.

Barolo to Valpolicella

Nicolas Belfrage

The northern wine regions the Verona trains run through.

More titles on the full city bookshelf or the Italian bookshelf.

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