Villa Volpi Lucca

... again, it was another one of those famous sites we all have seen many pictures of but to experience it in real life was a treat. Lunch and espresso at a little local joint, we seized the day, and continued on our journey.

Torre Pendente Facts:

Today it is leaning 17'-4" off of vertical.
Started construction in 1173.
Work stops in 1185 as tower begins to lean.
In 1285 work started again, with the new levels ...

Good Day everyone,
We've been traveling throughout Tuscany the past few days. We hit rain in Pisa .....lots of rain....but we used the Cathedral as a sanctuary ....imagine that! After the rain we drove to a beautiful and sunny view of the Mediterrain Sea. Came back that evening and decided we ...

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….

... to me was pretty cool. My dorm was just a two room apartment, with 11 beds. My bed was basically in the kitchen. It was cozy and I liked it, impossible not to make friends in a place like that. And the Australians were back in full force.

My first night I went out for dinner with a few people from the hostel and had what I think is the first full fish dinner of my life. Full fish meaning head included, looking ...

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 ...

... and eating and just enjoying the time together. Sure, there are aches and pains and problems, just like in anyone’s lives, but they are always “P.S.” You get the impression from these Tuscans that life is to be lived, not labored over.
DAY SEVEN
I couldn’t believe that I’d been here a week already… a happy blur! I was awake and bathed by nine; my bathroom had no stand ...

... large walls. I'm talking drive a couple of cars on them while a group of bicyclists pass an elephant kind of walls. It looked like you were walking in a city park when you were on them. I read that they were used for a number of years last century for racing cars. The city has since grown and expanded outside of the walls, but the interior is still very much like it was in the days of the Renaissance. The streets are ...

... bad. Had a great time driving around the area for the next few days, listening to mix CDs I created at local net cafes. On the Sunday, Pisa was holding a boat race - the "4 ancient maritime republics" of Italy (Pisa, Venice, Genoa, and Amalfi) compete every year in old-looking boats. Adding to this, it was a long weekend with the Friday being the "Festa della Repubblica" so every man and his dog came over to the Tuscan coast - it was really quite a party atmosphere.

... up in microwave. Not particularly memorable. The young lass who served us was probably the owners daughter, and now on school holidays. She tried out her English on us, with not too much success. When she established that we were from Australia, she probably explained that for holidays, she and her family went away to their holiday home. She was very helpful in serving us, but not sufficient English to quite get the message through. We moved the car around to the Via ...