Villa La Principessa Lucca

... 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.

... cook our own Italian dinner....wasn't bad.

Florence was a joy. Kara had a fun time driving in the traffic with all the crazy Italians! Our friends couldn't believe the amount of motor bikes and how they would weave in and out of traffic. The Dome and all that goes with it were great ...

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 ...

... Anyway after much driving we met a local who understood English… unfortunately he seemed only able to say he understood English .. And with us asking for the sea and him agreeing with everything.. It was more sea..si sea.. Si….very confusing…anyway put feet in a creek which seemed to be heading for the sea… and called it quits…..

The rain picked up again and it was a bit of a difficult drive for Geoff to make it to a town ...

Cinque Terre is a place I have heard a lot about, but wasn't planning to see on this trip. There aren’t a lot of places to stay and I hadn’t done my research on which of the five towns would be the best to stay in. But thanks to some advice and a gentle nudge from some friends in Florence, I decided to spend two nights there and do "the hike". It was a good decision.

I stayed in a town called ...

After travelling for the last 6 or more months without a real break we thought we might just settle down for the winter, instead of heading back to London and back to work. We are plonking ourselves with some of Dino's relatives in Tuscany.
Shona can't speak a word of Italian, but is planning to learn and not one of Dino's relatives speaks English. It should be an interesting few months.
We ...

... all, the organist was still up there, playing away! When his piece ended, he began another; we knelt and prayed some more, wondering if the lighting system and the length of his musical selections would ever synchronize. When the lights snapped off again we stole out of there, the organ still pumping away, but we were happy that we’d been treated so nicely. And his playing was actually very good!

Lucca, Tuscany, Italy jimmyboi2

... although I have heard more than 1 or 2 when I've been there :)that they didn't think much of it, and therefore all they did was to go shopping. In actual fact there are lots of lovely and interesting buildings and the old Roman amphitheatre has been transformed into apartments around a large piazza, probably in medieval times. Our short tour of Tuscany is over and we are now headed for a few days in the Cinqueterre, which I'm not sure if it's classified as being in Tuscany or Liguria.

Went back to Pisa after a mammoth series of transport - about 36 hours of sitting on ferries and trains. Ferries aren't so bad though, tons of space to move around, beds, bars, etc. Pisa was great to me the first time, and it didn't disappoint at all this time - the leaning tower's square is always magical, and this time I got to hang out and experience the real Pisa - a student town with plenty of energy and "italian-ness" about it. For my last few days in Italy ...

... the back verandah. It too is covered in frescoes, and looks out over the lawns to the mountains. As we were leaving, we discovered an open door into a cellar. We and a German family ventured down and had a wander. Vast wine cellars, primarily barrels, and all the old winemaking equipment. I made a fool of myself in declairing that I had discovered a small marble bath set into the floor in one room. Kind of like a modern spar pool, with a ledge around the inside to sit on ...