VISIT TO RAVENNA

Ravenna is a treasure chest of art, history and culture of the highest order, a city with ancient origins and a glorious past and capital three times, of the Western Roman Empire, of King Theodoric of the Goths and of the Byzantine Empire in Europe.
The basilicas and baptisteries of the city contain the richest heritage of mosaics dating from the 5th and 6th centuries and eight historic buildings included in the World Heritage List of UNESCO. If Ravenna was the most important political and cultural centre of the West during the centuries that saw the decline of the Latin civilisation, it is no less important in later ages, from the archaeology of the Domus dei Tappeti di Pietra to the vast Roman port of Classe. It is the city that guards the remains of Dante and keeps alive the memory of the great poet with important cultural events. The winding streets still reveal the past of a city built on a lagoon, the presence of water in the canals that cross it, closed during the period of Venetian rule and at the end of the fifteenth century opening the elegant space of Piazza Maggiore, now known as Piazza del Popolo. In the seventeen hundreds the city was connected to the sea by a navigable canal, the current port, which the people of Ravenna called the Candiano. The Corsini Canal then opened up a new prospective for resuming the ancient vocation as a port. The cultural offer of Ravenna is abundant and varied: the MAR, City Art Museum of Ravenna, programmes regular exhibitions of high profile and is home to a number of permanent collections; the National Museum exhibits a variety of collections, including finds from excavations of Roman and Byzantine remains; the Archiepiscopal Museum includes the Chapel of Saint Andrew (Unesco); the Dantean Museum holds relics connected with the cult and fame of the poet while the Museum of the Risorgimento bears witness to the lively sentiments of Mazzini and Garibaldi who stirred up the people of Ravenna in the more recent past. Just a short distance from the sea, Ravenna also offers nine seaside resort areas along its 35 kilometres of coast for a wide variety of holidays and stays. The organisation of services is efficient and dynamic, and the choice of holiday is as wide as ever: sunshine and relaxation, games, sports and fitness, excursions and parks, including Mirabilandia theme park, in addition to varied and delicious cuisine. There are many cycle tracks along which it is possible to cycle to any part of the city, Theodoric's park, the Planetarium, The Garden of Forgotten Herbs or the Basilica of Sant'Apollinare in Classe. For lovers of nature and excursions nothing can be more exciting than visit to the reserve of Punte Alberete with its silent swamped forests which provide shelter for rare bird species or a visit to the Nature Museum of Sant'Alberto, located at the edge of the lagoons. The historic pinewoods of San Vitale and Classe, unique as monuments to nature, have been included in the protected areas of the Po Delta Park. Ravenna is a living mosaic.