Italy - Where to go in 2008

Recently the New York Times chose the region of Tuscany and the east coast city of Rimini as the top Italy destinations for 2008. In Where We're Going in '08: Europe's Rising Stars, Fodor's chose the northern Italy city of Bologna and the southern region of Basilicata.

Bologna is a university town in northern Italy known for its beauty, great cuisine, and left wing politics. Bologna has lavish porticoed walkways and a compact historic center. It's the capital of the Emilia Romagna region, said to have the best regional cuisine in Italy.

The Basilicata region has rocky coastlines on the Tyrrenian and Ionian coasts with mountains and sparsely populated towns between. A good book about Basilicata is Carlo Levi's Christ Stopped in Eboli (compare prices), about his life in exile there. Basilicata's most fascinating city is Matera, with its cave houses and rock churches and one of my favorite festivals, Festa della Madonna Bruna. Matera was the setting for Mel Gibson's movie, the Passion of the Christ (compare prices).

My 2008 Italy travel plans include Bologna, Sicily, and Naples and nearby sites in the Campania region.

_{Travel Photo of Bologna © 2006 by Martha Bakerjian, licensed to about.com}