The leaning tower

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Our gamble with the weather had paid off - although the forecast was a 40% chance of rain, the day was absolutely perfect again, and started without a cloud in the sky!

Being only about 30 minutes walk from our hotel, we set off around 8am to towards the tower. As we approached the Field of Miracles it appeared over the top of the houses!

Even though you've seen it in pictures hundreds of times, seeing it for real is still amazing! And at that time of the morning, with very few people around, it's even better! Karina, of course, went a bit crazy with the camera, as she does whenever we visit a famous landmark that she has always wanted to see! I went off to buy tickets while she snapped the tower from every conceivable angle.

Turns out they only allow 50 people up the tower every 1/2 hour, and there were still 40 tickets left for the 9am ascent, so I grabbed them at about 8:40. I took a couple of the typical tourist shot - Karina holding up the tower - from the "best" spot as claimed on the internet, then we headed up.

There's still quite a lot of scaffolding and work going on, either restoration or stablisation or most probably both, but most of it is thankfully hidden from the photographs. The marble stairs heading to the top are very well worn in places, and it's interesting to see the wearing move from left to right on each step as you circle the tower.

The view from the top is simply breathtaking - my favourite view from any height we have seen on the trip so far. Pisa is only a small town, so you could easily see the extent of the town in every direction. Beyond that lay fields, mountains, and another city and the ocean in the distance. Absolutely beautiful! I took a 360 degree panorama shot of the view so I hope it comes out OK! And there were only about 10 people in our time slot!

All too soon we were ushered down, though not before the bell tolled only a few metres below us. There's 7 bells but seemingly only 1 tolled, and it was electronically controlled - and it was LOUD!

After admiring the church and the dome adjacent to the tower in the field, we wandered up and down the rather long line of souvenir stalls that surrounded the field on 3 sides (the medieval city walls lined the 4th side) looking for something to remember Pisa by. We then wandered down towards the hotel again, looking for a book on Pisa and somewhere to eat lunch. We found a nice little cafe and sat outside under cover for a relaxing lunch.

We then headed to the river, to admire what we had only fleetingly seen as we marched to the tower this morning. Not quite as interesting as Florence or Salzburg, the architecture was quite plain and the back drop not as impressive, but certainly not unpleasant.

The find of the day was the gelato store - Euro 2.50 for *4* generous scoops! That eclipses the 2.20 for 3 scoops we found in Venice. It tastes so much better when it's cheap, not like the 3.50 we paid for half the amount of gelato in Rome.

We walked back to the hotel via the main street and shops as we finished our gelatos. Pisa is a nice little town, but you're always in danger of being run over by a car, motor scooter or, perhaps more-so, a bicycle. Especially if you're stupid enough to walk on the footpath! In some areas there are signs designating "Pedestrian Zone". After a while I worked out what that actually means - it means if you get hit by a car/scooter/bicycle in a "Pedestrian Zone", then it's *their* fault. Everywhere else, it's *your* fault.

Back at the hotel around 4pm we had chores to do. We needed to book a few train trips and find some accommodation - not the least of which was tomorrow's! After reading that La Spezia wasn't particularly interesting or safe, we opted to base ourselves in Genova for 2 nights. From there we'll train it into the Cinqueterra towns, and scout out somewhere to stay for the remaining 2 nights. We've now booked trains as far as Montpellier (France) and accommodation up to Nice. Phew!

Last job was washing - fortunately there was a laundromat only a few hundred metres from our hotel. We filled a 7kg and 16kg machine. At least this time we could wash absolutely everything we needed to wash.

For dinner, we couldn't resist returning to the place we ate 2 nights ago, just near our hotel. I had gnocci and my beloved Pepperoni, Karina had a slad and pizza, and we shared a 1/2 litre of the house red. The FA cup final was playing on the big screen, so it was a little noisy but very, very enjoyable.

Back at the hotel, Karina booked Barcelona accommodation while I watched a very exciting ending to the soccer. It went to a penalty shoot-out, and after Ronaldo missed for Man U it seemed Chelsea had it in the bag, until they missed the 5th shot! Of course, a few shots later the Man U keeper saved a shot to give them the win. I don't think Karina was particularly impressed that I was more interested in the soccer than booking a hotel...

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