There’s a festive fee at Juliet’s balcony as the Verona attraction is overrun by crowds
By Maureen O’Hare, CNN
(CNN) — In our travel news roundup this week: Italy gets angry at “fake” carbonara, the winner of the Wildlife Comedy Awards is revealed, plus the phony tourist attractions built to please visitors.
Star-crossed or catfished?
“Juliet’s House” in Verona, Italy, is one of the city’s most popular attractions, despite the fact Romeo and Juliet never existed except in the head of William Shakespeare.
The 14th-century building (so from the same time period, at least) was acquired by Verona’s city authorities in 1905 and ritzed up into a romantic shrine to the fictional lovers, with the addition of a balcony and a statue of Juliet.
After a selfie on the balcony upon which no Capulet ever lamented, tourists customarily rub Juliet’s breast for good luck — a courtship ritual we hope never existed in the 14th century either. (Dublin has a similar problem with sightseers groping its statue of fictional fishmonger Molly Malone.)
As Verona undergoes a tourism boom, crowds in the courtyard have become so unmanageable that city authorities have stopped free entry over the festive period. From December 6 to January 6, visitors can only get a peep if they’ve bought a $14 ticket to Juliet’s House and Museum.
However, Verona’s blockbuster attraction is by no means the only tourist hotspot with inauthentic beginnings.
Take Iceland’s famous Blue Lagoon. The country has many natural hot springs, but none of them are as convenient to the airport as the artificial lagoon, plus it has a swim-up bar.
Similarly, Asia has lots of ancient Buddha statues, but Hong Kong’s super-popular “Big Buddha” was built in the 1990s.
Whether influenced by popular culture or just chosen as a handy location, there’s a host of places that were built just for visitors and their cameras – and, of course, their wallets.
Italian food gets UNESCO status
Most Italians already believe their food is the best in the world, but now UNESCO has confirmed it. Italy’s national cuisine has become the first entire gastronomic style to be recognized by the UN’s cultural body as an “intangible cultural heritage.”
It comes as Italy continues to fight against “fake” Italian food, such as the Belgian-made “carbonara sauce” with unorthodox ingredients that recently caused outrage in Italy after it appeared in a store at the European Parliament.
If you want to see how carbonara’s really done, look no further than the work of 84-year-old Italian grandmother Nonna Silvi. She has millions of followers on social media and was just voted Italy’s TikTok “Creator of the Year.”
She spoke to CNN about her favorite dish and the single ingredient she can’t live without.
Lost and found
Airlines typically spend three to four months trying to reunite lost suitcases with their owners. If they can’t, then in America the bags get sold to Unclaimed Baggage, an Alabama store which describes itself as the nation’s only retailer of items from lost luggage.
If you’re looking for left-handed kitchen shears, a papier-maché Tinker Bell or even a satin-and-lace wedding gown, you might just find them among the rows of clothes, shoes, books and electronics in the 50,000-square-foot space.
Over in the UK capital, Transport for London’s lost property warehouse receives more than 5,000 new items a week, including everything from phones to cooked frogs. Fewer than one in five items are reclaimed, while the rest gets auctioned off or donated.
A better night’s sleep (for just $10k)
Destinations around the world are tapping into the sleep tourism trend. CNN’s Barry Neild traveled to the Chenot Palace Weggis in the renowned wellness area of Lucerne, Switzerland, to see if a course of personalized treatments could help improve his slumber.
In case you missed it
A prestigious award. A social media ban. A devastating flood.
What do you remember from the week that was?
The winner of the Comedy Wildlife Awards is revealed.
It’s a high-fiving gorilla.
Forget Christmas.
In Sicily, they’re already thinking of Easter.
It used to be Cambodia’s capital.
Now it’s a city of the dead.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
