Vicenza; Saturday, 14 March, 2026

I wasn’t expecting much more than a croissant and an espresso for breakfast, so I was pleasantly surprised by the decent spread of meats and cheeses as well as bacon and eggs all accompanied by one of the strongest double espressos that I’d had in a while.

From the hotel I headed out into the city to go exploring and working my way through the list of museums and sights included in the joint ticket I’d brough the previous day – many of which have links to Palladio, naturally, with the first stop being perhaps one of his masterpieces – the Teatro Olympico – a large theatre located on the eastern edge of the historic city centre and, more importantly, the first every fully enclosed theatre in the world. The theatre is still in use, but during the day, if there isn’t a performance on, you can wander around the seating area and take in the auditorium and stage.

From the Teatro Olympico I wandered back through town taking in the very baroque (and therefore post Palladio) Pallazzo that now houses the Gallerie d'Italia, the museum headquarters of the Italian banking group Intesa Sanpaolo, and who would have thought a bank would own so much art! Almost opposite is the complex of the former Dominican monastery of Santa Corona. Today the chapel is still open as a church and the cloisters and attached buildings have been converted into the city’s museum of Natural History and Archaeology – all of which were on the ticket and so were looked around.

By now I’d managed to built up a bit of an appetite so I headed back to the same café I’d had my evening aperitivo in yesterday to see if they did lunch, and it turns out they offered toasted sandwiches which was exactly what I was looking for in a light lunch so I had lunch in there, which also helped to fill the time towards 2pm when several of the other sites I was interested in visiting today would be open.

From lunch I headed over to the Northwestern side of the old town to visit the Church and Cloister of San Lorenzo, and from there walked the short distance back to the Porta Castello as the Torrione del Castello was now open to look around. The tower has spent almost all of it’s existence being off limits to the public, but in the last couple of years it’s been taken over by a foundation who have repaired and rebuilt the inside turning it into a key place to take in the views of the city, though only on occasional Fridays and most weekends from 2-6, so you can see why this was something I’d timed my afternoon around.

The other site I’d timed the afternoon around was the Criptoportico Romano, like the Tower this is only open for a couple of hours in the afternoon at weekends, as it’s operated using volunteers. The guide takes you down into what were once the cellars of an opulent Roman residence, and today are one of the few remaining Roman parts of the city that you can visit, hidden below the Piazza Duomo and the Bishops Palace, which houses the Museo Diocesano di Vicenza which was my next and final museum stop of the afternoon, before concluding the afternoons sightseeing by popping into the neighbouring Cattedrale di Santa Maria Annunciata.

I headed back to the hotel to have a bit of a rest before heading back out to grab an aperitivo at a different bar, this one located behind the rear of the Basilica Palladiana, where I promptly had to keep moving to avoid the rain as a hefty shower, accompanied by some squally gusts of wind made staying dry, even under the giant awnings, difficult.

Thankfully it was only a short walk, and timed during a gap in the showers, to the restaurant I’d chosen for dinner, and by the time I’d finished another excellent meal the rain had mostly subsided for the night, so I was able to have a bit of a wander around the city in the dark, before heading back to my hotel and to turn in for the evening.