Pisa and Cinque Terre

Seaside Dinning

Manarola village

Monterosso Beach

Those expensive deckchairs!!

Church Manarola

Strange Lady

Our Apartment Terracotta building top right

Our view

Village Vino Shop

The leaning tower of Pisa was an interesting climb . We had tickets for entry at 9am and even at that early hour it was hot work. The narrow well worn stairs spiral around ( quiet claustrophic actually) till you reach the 6th floor where there are 7 large bells. Then you walk around an outside level to get to a VERY tiny spiral staircase that leads to the top viewing floor. Chris surprised us all by making it to the top ( see photo as proof) Pisa itself is abit of a weird souless city. It has some nice buildings but is very low energy!! We did have a really nice hotel with an awesome breakfast. ( One of our more upmarket digs)We then trained on to the Cinque Terre WOW!!! It was every bit as good as the brochures promised. 5 small villages balanced on the edge of cliffs on the mediterrean. The villages are reached by small pathways ( total walking 6 hours thru all 5) or a railway runs along the coast too. We stayed in a great studio Apartment at the top of the hill in Manarola village we had doors onto a balcony with a fabulous view over the whole village and could watch the boats at sea. We could sleep with the doors wide open and were woken by the church bells at 7 am in the morning.We ate fresh seafood and walked till our carves ached. Yesterday we went to Monterosso beach and paid 21 euro to hire 2 sunchairs on the beach ( were going to put 2 towels on the sand beside but boys ended up gettin a couple of free chairs) Got a good dose of sun which we spent last night regretting!! Its been real hot since south of france. But today we arrived in Florence and it was 37dg and very humid. At 5pm its still 36 dgs. We have been to see the statue of David  this avo but are just too hot to venture any further. We are going to walk around abit after dinner when the sun has set. We are staying in a pension in Florence. Our room has a small bathroom but the boys have shared bathroom down the hall way. Our Hosts are Carmel and Pino and Leo the talking parrot!! We are headin out to the shared terrace ( part of the hosts accom) with a bottle of Vino, brie, pesto and salami . So its Ciao from us til next time !!!