Bergamo photos

It's past time to put up a post.  My Italian lessons have been keeping me busy and I keep finding that the time when I might write something gets used differently.  There's grocery shopping, exploring the Città Alta (Upper City), finding my way around Bergamo proper, and enjoying dinners with the Terzis and their friends.  That has been one of the really special things about this stay.

Anyway, I've been taking pictures here and there, nothing like the number I did during the Umbria photo workshop, but some to record the world seen from my apartment and a little of what I've seen as I've walked around.  So this post, and maybe more, will focus on photographs.

This was the view from my apartment window looking northeast.  The first week I was here, it rained and the temperatures dropped to the low to mid-30s. 

 The next morning when the sun came up, the mountains had what people were saying was the earliest snowfall in the mountains that they could remember.

 A few days later, we finally had sunshine.

 My apartment, the vantage point for the pictures above, is that box on the roof just in front of the bell tower on the church of Sant'Allesandro della Croce, the patron saint of Bergamo.  The pictures were taken from from the left side.  Fortunately, the last bells are at 9 p.m., I think; and they wait until 7 a.m. to restart.  This photo was taken from the wall surrounding the Città Alta, the oldest part of Bergamo.  The street layout in the Città Alta still shows the influence of the original Roman settlers and many of the major buildings -- churches and public buildings -- were built in the medieval and renaissance periods.

 All the rain has made bike rides difficult, but I finally got out last Wednesday afternoon.  I set off without having any particular route; I was riding into the Brembana Valley and hoped, after braving busy roads for a few kilometers, I might be rewarded with some small, lightly-traveled mountain roads.  Not quite.  I made it up to Zogno, here, about 15 km north of Bergamo.  I did manage to find some quiet side roads above the main road running along the river, but not enough of them.  I've now talked to a couple of avid riders who live in the area and know the climbs, so I'm hoping for something better next time out.