April Was A Packed Month And The First Stop Was Italy
We knew that April 2026 was going to be an insane month for the both of us, starting with a conference in France and another in China two days later, Anna would also be visiting Laos for her volunteer work another two days after that, and then at the end of the month we’d be off to Sri Lanka for a Safari so she could get her mind off work for a bit. With a month like that on the cards, the best way to begin was with a short holiday for a few days before the French conference so we decided to have a getaway in Italy, particularly to a couple of spots we had never visited.
Thursday, April 2, 2026
We had taken a late overnight flight and Italy is six hours behind Singapore so we were pretty refreshed when we landed in Milan at around 7:30am, where we would then take a train to Genoa:
Genoa is the sixth-largest city in Italy and the capital of the Italian region of Liguria. As of 2025, 565,301 people live within the city’s administrative limits. While its metropolitan city has 818,629 inhabitants, more than 1.5 million people live in the wider metropolitan area stretching along the Italian Riviera.
On the Gulf of Genoa in the Ligurian Sea, Genoa has historically been one of the most important ports on the Mediterranean: it is the busiest port in Italy and in the Mediterranean Sea and twelfth-busiest in the European Union.
That description alone tells us what we already know, that the city is going to be beautiful and she’ll love the wine, but the main reason Anna chose Genoa was because it is the birthplace of one of her absolute favourite foods, pesto:
Pesto, also known as pesto genovese, is an Italian paste traditionally made with leaves of Genovese basil, extra virgin olive oil, Parmesan (alternatively Grana Padano), pecorino sardo, pine nuts, and garlic. It originated in the Ligurian city of Genoa and is used to dress pasta.
With that and the local seafood we couldn’t wait to sit down and get started, but it would take longer than we had anticipated, because in what would become a perpetual problem over the course of this trip, there was always some kind of delay with the trains, or in this case our 9:39am one was canceled and the next train was at 11:40am, meaning it would be almost 2:30pm by the time we arrived in Genoa and were at our hotel with its weird, wooden elevator hosting an old telephone.
At least it was a decent train station to be stuck in and our hotel room was really nice when we arrived:
Ted Bundy in court
It was time to get out and hit the town and just outside the hotel door while Anna was weighing up whether it was too late to have pasta or not I saw it on the street, beckoning, calling out to me, saying that there was far more to Genoa than just the cuisine; there was a serial killer museum (right)! Well, that’s tomorrow planned.
We spent ages just wandering around in the perfect weather, first making our way to Porto Antico to look at all of the ships, particularly Il Galeone Neptune and as always, possible locations for dinner, and then past the Palace of St.George and around Piazza De Ferrari to the main part of the city where we did a bit of shopping and occasionally pulled up for a beer while taking in the architecture and looking at stalls in food markets until it seemed like a more reasonable time to eat.
Any time that had been spent sitting while we were exploring the town, Anna was googling restaurants and when she first saw it she immediately had her heart set on Il Genovese, a restaurant founded in 1912. She was grinning from ear to ear when she saw in the menu that there was a Pesto World Championship and even more so once there when the food started arriving. I’m not sure of everything that we had ordered, however, it seemed a little more than a coincidence that Anna had worn a bright green top. Some bread came with pesto for dipping, as well as stuffed pastries and deep fried tripe, then onto pesto pasta and spinach and ricotta ravioli. Anna was one happy woman and I didn’t walk away disappointed either.
Dinner was done and now it was time to wander the streets once more to find a place for a drink, passing Genoa Cathedral, however, we would later realise that we weren’t in the most happening area as the options were kind of scarce. We eventually found a bar that suited our needs so we grabbed some drinks and made use of the dart board, but once we got to that stage in the evening when Anna completely missed the board three straight times, it was then that we realised we were probably a bit tired from the flight, the train, and the walking so we called it a night.
Around the city, dinner, and darts:
Will she ba able to keep it down?
Friday, April 3, 2026
Today would follow a slightly different path to the previous day, but despite the fact that we don’t usually eat much during the day, Anna figured after a bit of walking that we might need a little sustenance for what the main event would hold, meaning a different pesto pasta and a an octopus salad before hitting up the Genova Serial Killer Museum, or as described on its website:
Have you ever faced the perverse and tragic side of humanity? Have you ever seen how reality is worse than the most terrible fantasies?
Have you ever felt the terror that courses through the veins of those tortured and killed by the evil hands and minds that have always plagued the human race?
The Serial Killer Museum, located at Via Roccatagliata Ceccardi 14/R in Genoa, is truly a close and traumatic encounter with the incredible and unimaginable world represented by those who have dedicated their lives to ending the lives of others. In the worst possible ways.
Hell yeah! Serial killers have always fascinated me and naturally I had to dress for the occasion so I had earlier donned my Fred and Rosemary West t-shirt and we were on our way. The museum covered the following mass murderers (and Charles Manson), and if you click the name there will be the museum’s biography of each (you may need to click on the Union Jack as well if the text comes up in Italian):
- Ted Bundy
- Charles Manson
- Donato Bilancia
- Andrei Chikatilo
- Elizabeth Báthory
- Leonarda Cianciulli
- Luis Garavito
- Albert Fish
- Cayetano Godino
- Aileen Wuornos
- Jeffrey Dahmer
- Ed Gein
- John Wayne Gacy
It was a guided audio tour and as soon as we went downstairs to the main displays, the first being Andrei Chikatilo, we knew that this was going to be a strange exhibition. Not only did it appear that the Genova Serial Killer Museum doubled as a terrible wax figure display, but while standing in front of what looked more like Jeff Bezos we were told through headphones the story of Chikatilo raping, killing, and eating over 50 women and children while a kind of playful music made up the soundtrack that played in the background. We made our way around the room, Anna cringing at the stories behind the heinous cases while we both tried to stifle our laughter each time we saw a new wax representation. After an hour the tour was over so it was up to the gift shop to purchase some souvenirs. They mainly sold key rings, but they didn’t really have any that I particularly would’ve wanted so I settled for ones of Ted Bundy and Jeffery Dahmer. There were also key rings of different body parts, but the brain key rings looked kind of weird and if bought a heart one, people would just figure Anna’s dad had given it to me so in the end I opted for a dismembered finger.
In and around the Genova Serial Killer Museum and its startlingly un-lifelike representations:
With our latest venture into dark tourism complete it was time to roam around and take in some more sights, first passing through the medieval fortification Porta Soprana, through another square and exploring many of the narrow, winding streets, noting some potential spots for later in the evening, and passing one of the most stereotypically Italian-looking fruit shops one could ever encounter. Eventually we wound up in another area of Porto Antico and found the perfect location to take in the view over the water and see the Biosphere and the Bigo, an installation built for the Genoa Expo ’92, Anna’s focus soon shifting to where to eat later.
Dinner had now been planned so when we were feeling peckish we walked back to the square from a few hours earlier to Cucina Valoria. Being near the port they obviously had some great seafood and yet again everything we ordered was incredible, especially the bone marrow! When we had finished eating we meandered back up the hill to check out a few of the bars we had walked past in the smaller streets earlier and they were all pumping. Anna could get good wine anywhere, but we also eventually stumbled upon a craft beer place that had both so that’s where we settled in for the rest of the night.
The rest of day after spending a portion of it earlier with some mass murderers:
Saturday, April 4, 2026
When we woke up it was time to pack our stuff, check out of the hotel, and take our luggage for a short walk to the station so we could catch the train to our next stop, Turin:
Turin is a city and an important business and cultural centre in northern Italy. It is the capital city of the Piedmont region and of the Metropolitan City of Turin. From 1861 to 1865, it was the first capital of the Kingdom of Italy. The city is mainly on the western bank of the River Po, below its Susa Valley, and is surrounded by the western Alpine arch and Superga hill. The population of the city proper is 855,654 as of 2026, while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 1.7 million inhabitants. The Turin metropolitan area is estimated by the OECD to have a population of 2.2 million.
We passed a Christopher Columbus statue and arrived at the station with plenty of time which wasn’t actually necessary, as once again our train was delayed, this time for almost an hour. Fortunately vending machines in Italy actually have some decent snacks so I bought a packet of mini salamis to munch on while we waited, our train eventually picking us up at the station and dropping us in Turin in the middle of the afternoon, wasting a bit more of our time. We dumped our bags at Agorà Boutique Stays in the centre of town where we would be spending the following nights at 3:00pm and immediately headed out to make the most of what remained of this Saturday afternoon. One thing that immediately struck us was that Turin seemed significantly quieter than Genoa which made it easier to grab an outdoor seat at a bar in the square and see what there was around, particularly to eat. We were right near Aurora, a historical district, and there were some beautiful buildings so we ventured around the area, taking in Casa della Vittora, onto the Palatine Gate, past the Turin Cathedral, home of the Shroud of Turin, although we didn’t enter, and finished our adventure in Piazza San Carlo.
We had worked up an appetite but it was still a bit too early to eat so we dropped into a little microbrewery before dinner. We weren’t going to find good pesto or any seafood in landlocked Turin so it seemed that the next logical step was pizza, leading us to Fermento and I think we chose well if I do say so myself. Not only was there some interesting pizza options, but they also did pizza maki, essentially a pizza rolled in a similar way to sushi so obviously we had to get some of those and an actual pizza, each coming with a recommended beer pairing, which we’d need with the amount of anchovies and olives on ours, and maybe a few more afterwards.
Getting to Turin and our Saturday afternoon in town:
Sunday, April 5, 2026
Turin is a pretty sleepy town so we didn’t expect there to be a whole lot of action, especially on Easter Sunday, however, again it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to power up for the day so we started off with some beef tartare, an antipasto platter, and ravioli just in case. There were a couple of markets, but not much that catered to what we like and very few shops as well as the Museum of Human Anatomy were open so that would all have to wait until the following day and we primarily spent our Sunday walking around. The weather was spot on again so we opted to go to another area and just slowly make our way along the river. The scenery was absolutely stunning, but as is the case when next to a river in almost every city around the world there were quite a few joggers, however, they were nowhere near as sweaty as the ones in Singapore when they brushed past us. Also the path was lined with trees similar to cherry blossoms that were in bloom as we walked past bridges adorned with statues and the Monument to the Crimean Expedition, an obelisk in the middle of a roundabout, but soon Anna needed to pee. Our general approach to situations like this is to find a cafe or bar and buy something so the other can use the amenities and not long after we approached a bar called Peliti’s so it appeared that we had found the spot. However, once I entered to buy a drink it became abundantly clear by the different bottles stacked all the way to the ceiling that this was a vermouth bar and that is ALL they sold, just thousands of different bottles of vermouth, they even had it on tap. Fortunately their bathroom was accessible from outside so without having a drink we were on our way. We continued along the river and took in the views of the Church of Santa Maria al Monte dei Cappuccini on the opposite side, but by now we had been walking for quite some time so we turned around and walked back in the general direction of our hotel and eventually stuck to our routine; we stopped off for a couple of drinks and plotted dinner.
Anna was back on the pasta bandwagon again and suddenly had a revelation — We hadn’t had Pasta alla Routa, or cheese wheel pasta yet and there was now no way of convincing her that we could possibly have anything else, but I didn’t mind at all, I love it too. So what is cheese wheel pasta? Well, it’s exactly how it sounds, hot pasta is placed in a hollowed-out cheese wheel, then the waiter stirs it while scraping the sides of the cheese wheel bowl, coating all of the pasta in fresh cheese. We hunted out a restaurant, Melamangio, ordered an antipasto plate, another irrelevant pasta in case this wasn’t enough, and let the waiters work their magic inside a wheel of pecorino cheese next to our table.
A lazy Sunday in Turin:
Monday, April 6, 2026
We would be catching the Eurail to Lyon, France today, but that would be later in the afternoon, plus there would more than likely be the obligatory train delay so we could have a look around the shops in Turin properly for the first time, as well as a few other spots nearby. Many of the shops are in large arcades and most of it was quite upmarket so there wasn’t a whole lot that catered to our tastes, meaning we would just take one more look around the city. We passed Palazzo Carignano, the former private residence of the Princes of Carignano, but now houses a museum which reminded Anna of her plan days earlier, to visit the Museum of Human Anatomy. First, however, she wanted something sweet so after coffee we walked past the National Library, through Galleria Subalpina, a shopping and restaurant arcade that’s more of a giant greenhouse, behind the Palazzo Madama and stopped off for gelato and hot chocolate. Once done and we were on our sugar rush it was on to the Museum of Human Anatomy:
Turin’s Museum of Human Anatomy was established in 1739 and was transferred to the Anatomical Institutes Building in 1898, after which it remained virtually untouched.
Indeed, time seems to have stopped in this “cathedral of science”, as the restorative interventions have sought to recreate the 19th century atmosphere. The museum’s exhibition maintains its original configuration.
In fact, the showcases are crowded with specimens, lack internal lighting and are almost devoid of explanatory texts, as was customary in 19th century museums. Nevertheless with three videos, a brief guidebook and a series of information sheets complement, the museum has much to tell about the history of the collections (including that of anatomical wax models, one of the richest in the world), about scientific discoveries and about the activities of Turin’s School of Anatomy in the last 300 years.
The museum was a disappointment and actually a kind of boring way of spending the afternoon, plus photography was forbidden so unlike the Serial Killer Museum in Genoa, I was only able to get a sneaky picture of some trepanned skulls. When we exited the museum I guess the sight of medically dissected human remains had made us a little peckish so we spent our remaining time just snacking on a small pizza and reminiscing about the past few days in Italy before moving on to France. The hotel had kept our luggage for us so we collected it and went down to the station only to find that yet again we had a significant train delay and would be arriving in Lyon a fair bit later than expected.
Our final day in Turin:
So that’s it for the Italian holiday leg of this trip. Coming up we eventually get on our train to Lyon, France so Anna can attend the World Health Organisation conference, as well as catch up with our friends visiting from Germany and eat like kings.
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