Park Moderno Montecatini Terme

... on the "uphill" side as ballast.
This gives the tower a slight 'banana" shape.
An attempt was made in 1836 to dig out the foundation, yet lean worsened.
It was closed in 1990 to visitors as collapse was thought imminent. Tower then nearly 18'-6" off.
Stabilization work was begun in 2000 which brought the tower back toward plum by 11".
Re-opened to tourists in 2001 in groups of 30, attended by a guide only.

Pisa

woke up to pouring rain again so lucky we had a good look at the views the afternoon before… but made a tricky drive down in rain then onto Autostade.. Very fast but pouring rain to start with… finned up as we neared the coast… made it to Pisa… drove in traffic and down one way streets.. Mainly the right way we ...

... B we had booked… it was a restored castle on top of the hills in Tuscany… after much winding roads on what appeared to be a single road to nowhere we found it and it was worth the effort…..we sat on to of the hill looking at olive groves and the hills beyond.. Magnificent…. Dinner was a Florentine steak.. Yes just one steak between 4 of us.. The biggest T-bone in the world… amazingly tender .. View from top of mountain great….

... it could jump off my plate at any moment… I had a bit of trouble de-boning the thing, but an Australian girl with much more fish eating experience helped me out.

On my only full day, I did the five town hike with two people from my hostel. The weather was not entirely cooperative, cloudy with a bit of rain. But the scenery was still amazing, colourful towns built into the cliffside, separated by ...

... room with free breakfast (eggs!) and dinner (pasta or pizza, naturally) made for some serious socialization and some interesting folks.

We confirmed the best gelato in the world claim made by the Trinity Gelato shop... twice. Mascarpone and Chocolate being the ultimate flavours, we saw the David by Michealangelo and found it a unique experience as compared to everything we had seen up to that point. There was a fascinating photo exhibit set up temporarily at the ...

... the wine for families living in each town. Pretty cool. We tasted a small bottle of local white wine... it was a little bubbly and dry - kinda like Proseco? I wanted to try red wine (since that's my fave) but they did not have any. The hotel we stayed at was a very clean, very simple room with a laundry line out the window. There are about 5 million very steep steps leading up to the room. When we checked in (by buzzing a buzzer near the main ...

... with chocolate custard and then dipped in chocolate and nuts at one end. Lovely almond, shortbread type cookies. Gelaterria's: you can buy gelati in small cups, waffle cones or giant waffle cones (which Mark had today!). Flavours include rich chocolate, pistachio, tira misu, caramel, cherry, rasberry, mars bar, etc, etc. It is heavenly. You can even get a solid chocolate cone, dipped in nuts, but we haven't succumb to this yet ! We had ...

... religious themes, there's lots of 'adoration of the christ child' depiction which all become a bit same, same after a while. The Accadaemia was pencilled in for 2:45pm so we had a bit of time to kill in between, filled by a coffe and and a stroll through the markets. You really only come to the Accadaemia to see one thing - Michaleangelo's 'David.' We both agree it lives up to the hype. It's much larger than you imagine and is well placed at the end of a long corridor filled with good ...

... we had the tight streets and alleys and it's 14 medieval towers all to ourselves and the locals. This was really the way these places should be experienced and that's a tip for you all.

A few days later we took a longer 'day trip' that turned into an overnighter. Driving on the Autostrada was comfortable, once you got used to drivers burying their headlights behind your trunk when you are already cruising at 130km/h(yes, the European ...

... chained to the bridge. It is an old tradition for young lovers to buy a padlock and attach it to the Ponte Vecchio and then take the key and throw it into the Arno to symbolize their eternal commitment to each other. Apparently some folks don't understand the symbolism or are not quiet ready for such a strong commitment because a few of the locks were actually combination locks. We crossed the bridge and walked as far south as the Palazzo Pitti before turning ...