Live from Lovely Livorno

---

PP:
Tuesday 14th April:
Arrived in Livorno yesterday morning, as the sun was rising through haze and mist - beautiful sunrise. The port area is quite tidy and clean, and it is quite busy but not as big as some we've been to. We were a bit slow starting to explore because the new Chief Mate (Michael) was a bit offhand about letting us know when er were cleared by immigration. I chased the Captain and he confirmed everything was okay. So about lunchtime we went to the city centre. Some nice Italian dock people with not much English drove us one at a time to the gate, because no one aboard seemed to know where it was - it seems that this is the first time anyone on this ship has been there. Now we know where it is, it is not very far to walk. There is a bar/cafe next to the gate and another nice woman ordered us a taxi, and the driver was very helpful. We walked (about 30 minutes) to the train station to look for internet, and found an internet spot in a shopping centre next to that. Taxi back to the City centre, and walked to find a nice restaurant for dinner later. Found a bar in the meantime where they serve quadruple shots of rum to flavour slightly with coke - plus peanuts, crisps and even sandwiches for free. We watched the sun set over the boat harbour from there and had dinner at La Volte next door. It was a very nice dinner - John the Pom was with us and seemed to enjoy his first ever taste of lobster. Taxi back to the ship at about midnight, and to bed, quite tired.
Wednesday 15th April:
Slept in a little then back to Livorno - we got exactly the same driver as yesterday - and this time he took us to an internet point where we could use our own laptops (yesterday we had to use the ones supplied). Much more convenient, as the european keyboard has some differences in layout that are not intuitive for us, and when the markings on the keys are mostly worn away, it was a bit of a guess sometimes which key we were pressing. Anyhow, another sunny day in Livorno, and warm! We leave here tomorrow, and the next stop will be Jakarta. I don't think we'll get any internet at Port Said and the Suez Canal, as we are not scheduled to stop there, just pass through. So it may be three weeks or so to the next post.

---

Photos

Ferry out of Livorno
Quite bright!

Waiting for a Taxi
At the Gate

John the Pom and PP.
It's a hard life!