Hotel Minerva Arezzo

... Osteria Gucini Restuarant: Grilled Veal with Shaved Truffle and Hand Rolled Spaghetti with Smoked Ham, Tomatoes and Cream, followed by Pana Cotta. Our first experience with truffles, more smell than taste!<br>Next morning a 7.00 am departure from the apartment took us on to the Autostrada, this time, north to Firenze Airport.<br>After a bit of a delay we were on our way to Spain!

... dellightful cafe for lunch: Margaharita Pizza, with a thin crispy base, belissimo! This cafe is well known as a meeting place for Hollywood stars.<br><br>Cortona has very narrow and steep streets, purrfect for pets.<br>Finally we arrived back at Arezzo and after booking a haircut for myself tomorrow (the hairdresser doesn't speak English so that will be exciting) I am sitting at the La Dolce Vita cafe writing this entry while Jane is off looking at the shops (gulp)<br>

... make that TWO, hand made bags. Not sure how she is going to carry both but I''m sure she will work it out.Walking past the Duomo, we then ventured onto the Ponte Vecchio, the old bridge over the Arno river. The shops on the bridge were almost entirely gold and jewellry shops, not many punters inside them thoughTomorrow we will attempt a day trip in the Panda, wish us luck<br><br>

... an exploratory sortie of about 100km and 4 hours.. <br><br>Eventually we somehow made it to the designated free parking area, which is situated about 10 minutes walk from our place. This is because the old walled town has restricted vehicle access due the narrow confines of the medieval streets.After a restorative cup of tea (see, we don ...

... Ricardo uncovered a 500 year old fresco on the bedroom wall which had been painted over by the communists!! but an old fellow was able to help Ricardo find it. Last night we went for short stroll to pick up some supplies and we chose our first restaurant for the night's meal, a simple pasta dish.Today we did some more exploring and stumbled across a food market which covered about 3 blocks. Rusty's market in Cairns has nothing compared to this one, I ...

... hundreds of tables filled with all variety of goods &#8211; carvings, swords and spears from Africa, blown Venetian glass and delicate lace as thin as a spider's web, hand-woven silk from India in crimson red, turquoise blue, forest green and black as night. Dealers showed stamp, coin, book and photo collections as well as rifles, various fighting instruments, gunpowder, bullets and an assortment of holsters from past wars. Also on display were many pieces of restored and new ...

... of a Fiat Cleo, a small, comfortable four door sedan. Tuscany was ours to enjoy. Car + Two Trains = More Challenges After enjoying our final Tuscan breakfast, we said goodbye to Villa di Piazzano and headed for Arezzo. The traffic was heavy and slow through the towns, and I kept one eye on the road and the other on the clock. We had to find fuel, return the car and catch our second train. After ...

... That wasn't such a good idea. All we found w**e couples holding hands, walking down the expensive blvd with all the Gucci type stores. You know you are in the tourist part of town when you see ladies taking pictures of ice cream stores. "and h**e is the store wh**e we ate ice cream..." We ventured down a few side streets between the hundreds of old church like buildings that sit on ev**y corn** of the main part of town. Aft** while they all started looking the same and ...

... Canadians.. living up to their reputation. :-) It was actually really cool! -caught our train to Parma and switched on to our next one... which seemed to be behind schedule, because we sat on it, waiting and waiting long past its posted departure time. Finally I got off the train to see if I could find out how late it was. We were worried about making our next connection. Uh, but when I looked at the board it wasn't our train at all.. it was headed off ...

... and yields lovely views of the city of Florence. Giardino di Boboli (Boboli Gardens) Then its back to the happening Piazza della Signoria, where the queues to get into the Uffizi have increased. There are lots of street performers entertaining the appreciative tourists. We sit and watch the antics of some of the mimes and listen to a guy playing a ...