ITALY

My country, for no reason in the world I would trade it for any other, despite its flaws.

Especially when I travel, I feel proud because, as says Renzo Piano “For this Italian style there is always a sitting place at the table, in the rest of the world.”

And Florence, city of birth and of studies, tirelessly at the top of the cities that I love most.

SLOVENIA

A country crossed in a hurry during my trip to Croatia by bike, of which I have a pleasant and positive remember.
It always comes back to mind the Magistral leading into 40 mile in Croatia, immersed in the green countryside, surrounded by a double row of trees to shade it, no doubt of Roman construction.

CROATIA

Spectacular cornerstone of my cycling expedition, with beautiful sea, beautiful hilly landscapes, cities full of history.
I will be back again, to savor the curves…struggling a bit less!
Here I would like to visit Plitvice, missed the last time, Dubrovnik, the pearl of the Adriatic, and Split, with its palace of Diocletian of the Roman era.

BOSNIA AND HERCEGOVINA

A few miles to get to the border of Montenegro, I’d like to have a more intense look to this country, to Mostar and Sarajevo, to smell the air of old conflicts and new hopes.

MONTENEGRO

Like many of the Balkan states, is underestimated by tourism, but can offer breathtaking scenery as well as a wealth of history, enclosed in mountain villages, Roman towns and monasteries.
Notable national parks, especially that of Lake Skadar.

ALBANIA

Castles, beautiful sea, parks: this has to offer Albania, the one that basically we do not know enough but that can give you unexpected surprises.

GRECIA

Greece, well, it does not need any introduction, the homeland of the ancient culture has to offer just about everything, especially to me who I studied architecture, with its classical buildings, then we have the sea, the food, the people…and the sun! Oh yes, here will be really hot!

TURKEY

Turkey has engraved in my mind the memory of when, 7 years old, I visited the most important city here, even if not the capital: Istanbul, a mixture of culture, an unmistakable scent of history, the bazaar, the Hagia Sophia, Pamukkale , Goreme (whose buildings carved into the tufa were also a subject of my studies in Architecture).

GEORGIA

A mysterious country to me, which demarcates the line of physical separation between Europe and Asia with the chain of the Caucasus, majestic and impressive.
A host of monasteries, landscapes, ranging from swamps to glaciers, and Russia is now behind the horizon.

RUSSIA

Russia, the biggest country in the world, the infinite contained in the landscapes of Siberia, the fear of the dictatorship and the gulags, the challenge of the BAM road, the majesty of the Baikal that contains one fifth of the world’s freshwater, the warmth of people who live in regions so cold and distant from everything: this is Russia, this is the nation that most intrigues and at the same time intimidates me.

KAZAKHSTAN

Bad roads, dry climate, almost desert, steppe, but also things that should not be underestimated: cities like Astana or Almaty, Lake Balkhash, which is slowly disappearing as the Aral Sea, and the Charyn Canyon, a mini Grand Canyon.

MONGOLIA

Mystical Mongolia, it has something magical that we can not explain, yet its verdant highlands make us dream, the traditional Mongolian tents inhabited by people who are happy with nothing, the camels, the Gobi desert near the border with China, and finally the capital Ulaan Baatar, the coldest capital of the world.

JAPAN

Finally, the pearl of Asia, a land of a thousand contradictions, based on work and nationalism; its history is important, but was denied after the Great War, we go from the traditions handed down from one generation to the flashy young rebels, until the technology of the most advanced in the world.
Love and hate, this is Japan.