Brescia

We went to Brescia Halloween weekend :)

Brescia is between Milan and Venice and is quite a large city. We were going to do Verona and Brescia in one day but we liked it so much there we decided to leave Verona for another day. 
This is a cool looking door in the middle of Brescia. It is someone's garage door but it looks like it should be entrance into some secret society lair!

The vaulted ceilings at the town hall

Just liked this window!!!!

The top of the town hall, VERY fancy for a town hall!!

The two fools at the top of the clock tower who ring in the hour

Another balcony that I would like to be able to visit, so I took a picture of it instead :)

The lion sculptures/rain spouts on the front of one of the older churches in Brescia

The view of the new Duomo from the side street, same roofing as the legislative buildings in Edmonton :)

The new Duomo...and by new I mean it was built from 1604 and finished in 1825.

The new Duomo with the Rotunda, or old Duomo in the background. That one is old :) It was build in the 11th century.

The front of the cathedral looking into the square

Old and new-ish

I just liked the look of this place!!!

Cool little street crossing with Italian flags and statues built into the walls. Who knows how long those statues have been there!

A statue on the back of the Duomo, holding a feather which seemed to be one of the symbols of Brescia

Roman looking fountain leading into the castle park

The castle peeking out between the trees as we started out ascent. This would have been a HORRIBLE castle to attack because you would have to climb uphill all the way to get to it and then scale rocks at the end to even get to the outside walls. I'm sure archers would have picked me off ten steps from where I took this picture!

Reese enjoying her new scarf and touque, the scarf has built in mitts which she LOVES

The castle, and a sun flare coming through one of the openings in the outer wall. Plus the wooden wall below it

Looking up through the bottom part of the gardens

very pretty, this part reminded me of Canada for some reason :)

I'm assuming this is so that fallen rocks don't hit everyone hiking up below, pretty hard core!

The rocks you would have to climb back in the day to attack the castle...not fun

The lovely walkway up into the castle

Super creepy well, gave me the shivers

Holly was out!!! very pretty, it was everywhere :)

The stairs going up between the outer wall and courtyard. Believe it or not Reese climbed up ALL of these stairs! We kept trying to pick her up but she'd say "Reese climb stairs!"

There she goes

At the top you run into this tunnel which was also creepy, dark and cold.

But you came out into a lovely open courtyard kind of area overlooking Brescia

Reese and Richard posing for the camera

Italian style kiss

Ahhhhh a gun :)

Brescia, looking North towards the mountains

More Brescia, you can see the Calcio(soccer) field just below

Looking south 

More trees

Looking up at the tower and the keep of the castle from outside the inner walls

Reese sticking her head in the lion's mouth :)

J'adore fall!!!!! I love the colours in this picture :)

The tower on the corner of the inner walls

More tunnels

I just liked the way this looked, kind of bleak and hopeless, a castle abandoned. This was actually a very well taken care of castle though, one of the nicest I've ever seen.

The view from the top of one of the north towers on the wall

Looking back into the castle

It was like a maze in there, seriously we took like 5 wrong turns, there were paths and doors leading all over the place!

My artistic shot of grains growing in the cracks of the wall

More artsy shots :)

Beautiful place, creepy history!!! This place used to be the executioners green where they offed everyone!

Looking out into Brescia again

Fixing the scarf/mitts combo

Looking down at the paths we had climbed up

The upper wall

The vineyards below

The hillside villages and vineyards

Just liked the view on this one :)

Reese and Daddy

Mama and Reese

Leaves turning colours

Artsy shot of a guy walking alone

The DRAWBRIDGE!!!! How cool :)

Inside the castle now

Stone trough thing which is now being used as an unofficial planter :)

Artsy shot again- door lock

The castle keep and tower

Inner courtyard looking out to the east

The tower

Weird looking staircase! Apparently the original one

Suit of armour from the 1500's This was in the Ancient Arms museum which was inside the keep. The keep was built on top of a temple that was initiatied in the first century AD, the ruins are underneath the keep and have been excavated and the museum has been built around them so as not to destroy them. Some of the frescos were preserved. Pretty awesome!

Ouch

It was a very well planned and impressive museum

the temple ruins

fresco

more ruins

seriously, these are hardcore

The little street coming back down from the castle into Brescia the front way. It was charming!