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BERGAMO |
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Just 50km northeast of Milan, yet much closer to the mountains in
look and feel, BERGAMO is a city with a split identity, made up of two
distinct parts - Bergamo Bassa , the lower, more modern centre, and
Bergamo Alta , clinging to the hill 1200 feet above the Lombardian plain.
Bergamo Bassa is no great shakes, a mixture of suburbs and pompous
Neoclassical town planning; but Bergamo Alta is one of northern Italy's
loveliest city centres, a favourite retreat for the work-weary Milanese,
who flock here at weekends seeking solace in its fresh mountain air,
wanderable streets and the lively, but easy-going pace of its life.
Bergamo owes much of its magic to the Venetians, who ruled the town for
over 350 years, building houses and palaces with fancy Gothic windows
and adorning many a facade and open space with the Venetian lion -
symbol of the republic. The most striking feature, however, is the ring
of gated walls. Now worn, mellow and overgrown with creepers, these kept
alien armies out until 1796, when French Revolutionary troops
successfully stormed the city, throwing off centuries of Venetian rule
The City
However you get to Bergamo, you'll arrive in BERGAMO BASSA , which
spreads north from the railway station in an uneasy blend of
Neoclassical ostentation, Fascist severity and tree-lined elegance. At
the heart of things, the mock-Doric temples of the Porta Nuova mark the
entrance to Sentierone , a spacious piazza with gardens, surrounded by
nineteenth-century arcades and frowned down upon by the Palazzo di
Giustizia , built in the bombastic rectangular style of the Mussolini
era. This is the liveliest part of the lower city, busy most of the day
and especially during the evening passeggiata, but it has no great
appeal, and you'd be wise to save your energy for BERGAMO ALTA , easily
walkable using the funicular at the top end of Viale Vittorio Emanuele
II, or by taking bus #1A from the train station, which drops you just
inside the northwestern gate of Porta Alessandro at Largo Colle Aperto. |
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