Ravenna and the mosaics

In 546, Archbishop Maximian commissioned the glittering imperial mosaics at San Vitale where Justinian and Theodora stand like minted portraits—purple sandals, jeweled chalices, readable brocades. Just 80 km from Ferrara, these panels survive as a political statement on the former Adriatic shoreline, while the nave of Sant’Apollinare Nuovo still parades processions in tesserae and the green apse of Classe stages a lesson in light. Dante died here in 1321; his 1780 neoclassical tomb and the contested fate of his bones still fuel Florentine pride.

We collect you at your hotel in Ferrara in a Mercedes, with the car and driver at your disposal all day; the run along the E45 takes about 1 h 10 while you watch Romagna’s flat horizon slip by. In Ravenna, your private driver in Emilia-Romagna fine-tunes stops, waits during visits, secures San Vitale time slots if needed, and times Classe to dodge crowds. You taste a piadina, step into the Orthodox Baptistery, and depart on your terms—with a last espresso under the pines on Via di Roma before the smooth ride back.