Parma

Ended up going on a last minute trip to Parma on Sunday! Its only an hour and half outside Milan so not quite as long as our journey on Friday, but still had to get up at a fairly early hour. Having not had time for breakfast, as soon as we arrived we wandering into the centro historico for a brunch of prosciutto and foccaccia, simple but absolutely delicious. We explored Parma a little after, its quite small but very pretty particularly the main square which has an impressive statue of Garibaldi in front of a tower with the most incredible sun dials on (which you can kind of see in the photo). Never seen such intricate ones, had no idea how to read them but they threw impressive shadows over the wall. After a bit of a wander, we bought a couple of beers and sat in the sun in the park - was so lucky with the weather that weekend! Managed to spend most of the afternoon in the park before deciding we'd try and buy some proper Parma ham before heading home. Typically, it being a Sunday, most of the shops had shut but luckily we managed to find one! After a last minute panic trying to buy tickets in a very crowded train station and nearly missing the train as none of the validation machines were working, we made it onto our train. Only to find that it was so busy that we had to stand most of the way... Just glad it was only an hour and a half and not the three hours to the Cinque Terre!