San Marino for the win

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Sunday February 14, 2016 – I woke up in Rimini at 7am and decided to get started early. There was a bus to San Marino at 8:15 and I decided to try for that instead of the 9:30. The weather forecast was for rain all morning but it wasn’t raining then, so it seemed like a good idea to walk over to the bus before it began. It was only 10 minutes to walk to the bus, much closer than I had anticipated. While I waited, a Sri Lankan guy chatted me up to tell me about his time in Sri Lanka (good), and Dubai and Saudi (bad), Muslims (bad), and America (problematic). Luckily the bus came and he was not going there, so off I went. The bus took 45 minutes and in that time I made a plan of what I wanted to do while I was there with a brochure that Rita gave me.

San Marino is a small country in the mountains, but when I arrived it was raining and reasonably hard to tell if it was beautiful or not. I was under the hood of my jacket and umbrella, so it was hard to see anything much at all. Pictures were much harder to deal with. I ended up buying a pass that let me into five sights. Once I could figure out how to even get into the town from the bus – by following some others trying to figure it out – I started with the Public Palace, where parliament sits. Then I went to the State Museum and the Basilica. At this point the rain was almost done, it seemed, and there was even a rainbow and a view! From there I went to the St Francis church, which was undergoing renovation and all wrapped up and creepy like you'd want a church to be. It even had organ music come on as I was halfway down the aisle. Next was the attached museum and then I stopped for an early lunch at 11:00. I was hungry and it was really raining again, so I took a break from the weather. I had two main sights to see – the First and Second towers. They are both fortresses from times past. There is also a third tower that is much smaller and not accessible. I saved them for last in case the weather got better. And it did. Due to the nature of being in the mountains, the weather changed so many times, and quite dramatically. At first, it was hard to see anything due to the rain. Then I could see the surrounding hills becoming clearer. Then the sun was shining and it was glorious, and the towers were the best place to see such views – so dramatic. Then there was a total whiteout, but only on one side of the tower. On the other side it was still sunny. And you could see both sides at once. It was such a high, in contrast to the low with the kindle yesterday. And the towers are all on a lovely walk away from town. I went to the two you could go in and then walked to the third. So great. And by then I was even starting to sweat. The weather was crazy, but the day was a heck of a lot more enjoyable than it started. The bus left every 75 minutes, and the last was at 6pm. I ended up getting the 2:15pm bus – much earlier than anticipated, but the weather was turning again and I had seen everything I wanted to. I even bought two postcards that came with stamps attached, wrote them and sent them before leaving.

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Photos

This looks anatomically incorrect.
And why is it for Mary to breast feed, but no one else?