Italy

So we are back from Italy after enjoying a week of sunshine. We stayed in a little town called Montecantini and explored around a bit. One of the evenings there was a n open air concert in one of the spa buildings (picture below). It was amazing to listen to an orchestra surrounded by marble pillars ...

Street in Montecantini

Random building, could have been the Muncipal building, in Montecantini

We went to Pisa but got there a bit too late, around midday, and it was boiling hot and full of tourists so we saw the tower, wondered around, had some lunch and headed back home. The train journey back took nearly three times as long as it should have taken! So the day in Pisa wasn't the best but we had a nice refreshing swim in the hotel when we got back.

Houses by river Arno

Next to Montecantini where we were staying was a hilltop town of Montecantini Alto, you could get there by a funicular. We went there couple of times and had fun exploring the streets and eating some ice cream. In the local church they had the most amazing nativity scene, it had flowing water and moving figures. We also saw lots of bats there when we wondered around at dusk.

View from Montecantini Alto

Me & Wiggles

We also went to a little medieval town of Lucca that is still completely surrounded by it's old walls. It was very cute, lots of nice little streets and not too many tourists around. We had learnt from our Pisa experience and got there early before it got too hot. We spent couple of hours wondering around the streets and taking pictures and once the weather got hotter we went and had a coffee & cakes (the picture I posted yesterday).

After that we went into couple of churches and then had a lovely lunch in a little restaurant by a square where none of the waitresses spoke much English and the menu was all in Italian...we had some really nice pasta and tasty tiramisu before heading back to Montecantini and spent rest of the afternoon splashing about in the pool.

Detail of a church in Lucca (above & below)

Drying the washing Italian style

Little street somewhere in Lucca

Me on the city walls with the city behind me

Me in Vinci

The last day we hired a car and drove around Chianti seeing some lovely countryside, lots of hills and vineyards.

The dinner is ready so I am going to go and eat some fish pie. Maybe a bit more of the holiday later.

PS: all these photos are from David's camera that's why there are no pictures of him