When Fred Plotkin talks about being a pleasure activist, it's about switching on our senses

instead of living on autopilot. We eat, but we don't savor. We hear, but we don't listen.

We see, but we don't absorb. We touch, but we don't feel. Coming up, Fred tells us why the area around

Bologna in northeast Italy is his favorite place to eat in the entire world

and what he learned from the way they cook and prepare a meal.

Pork is like the music of Verdi, nothing goes to waste.

Further south, the island of Sicily rates as a favorite place for Italians to go

for a culinary adventure.

So we are what we eat, and Sicilians, actually, they have the best of the best, because they have the best of different worlds.

We'll also explore Arrow Island in Denmark, where cute and cozy are a way of life.

It's the landscape, it's the light, it's the buildings, the people.

It's all just ahead on Travel with Rick Steves.

Each region of Italy boasts colorful traditions and amazing foods.

But for a talophile Fred Platkin,

the area around the prosperous city of Bologna called Amelia Romagna

is a cut above them all.

He'll explain in just a bit on today's travel with Rick Steves.

We'll also hear how the sunny island of Sicily is a favorite getaway for Italians from the mainland.

But let's start today on an island in the cooler Baltic waters of Denmark.

As the maritime industry declined, so did Denmark's Arrow Island in the Baltic waters of Denmark. As the maritime industry declined, so did Denmark's Aero Island in the Baltic Sea.

Today, the colorful centuries-old buildings of aeroscoping are filled with busy shops,

inns, and restaurants.

...