Friday, April 8th, Volterra and Pisa

Today we got up and I got my chance to brush up on driving a stick. It really came back quickly except for the part of pushing in the clutch as you start it so that you do not lurch forward. So being quite clever, I put it in reverse when I parked at the edge of the cliff so that if I forgot, at least we would not go over. I forgot. :~(

Volterra is another Hill Town, but it did not seem to have the charm of San Gimignano, although there were definitely less people there. Fans of Twilight will recognize this town as the home of the Volturi. We made sure to wear garlic and get out quick to avoid any hungry vampires.

Next we decided to drive to Pisa. I was kind of iffy on whether I wanted to go there as it is time consuming, nothing to see except the tower, and a supposed nightmare to drive through. But I think we were all concerned that we would be sorry if we did not see it, so we went. It was not a pretty drive, Pisa is a dirty, grimy city, driving through the city was a nightmare with no signs and insane drivers, and I sighed a great sigh of relief when I saw a sign for public parking. I really had no idea where we were in the city, but I did not care. Happily we found a bus station just 1 block away and we took the bus the rest of the way. In fact, we were only 2 blocks away from the train station where I was hoping to park, so we came close. Did I mention it was a nightmare?

The Leaning Tower of Pisa was actually more impressive that I thought it would be. It was made from very pretty white marble and the ramp to climb to the top spiraled around the outside. It was definitely leaning more than I was expecting. It was quite obvious that at the 4th story that they corrected the lean by building a lean back in the opposite direction. The bell tower is also built back as another correction.

We had a lot of fun shooting funny pictures and enjoying the sunshine. We were all quite impressed with the HUGE crowd of people. It was totally packed with lots of tacky souvenir shops. Still the white marble of the church and baptistry with the bell tower (the Leaning Tower) all looked very pretty with the large green lawn.

We managed to get on the right bus back and find our car. Getting out of Pisa was not so easy but with a slight detour, we made it and headed back to San Gimignano. After dinner we all split up and went different directions and just had a quiet peaceful evening