Pisa - April 20th

Tried to catch an earlier train today and spend more time at Genova but no luck so ended up spending 3 hours in Ventimigglia. This is a small town on the coastline and is just on the Italian side of the border between France and Italy.  It was a beautiful sunny day so we took a walk through the town.  There was a food market and because we had our bags Rod sat outside in the sun while I went for a wander through the market.  There was an array of fruit & veges, fish, cheeses, pizzas, flowers and all sorts of other things.  I got down one end of the market and a guy was talking away to me in Italian, trying to give me a sheet of paper.  I said “No comprende English only” and he promptly flipped the page over to hand me the sheet in English.  It was for a restaurant in the street.  I had only taken a couple more steps when an  older man came up to me and started again in Italian.  I said again No comprende English only and he said “Oh really, are you from Australia?” I said no New Zealand.   He shook my hand and said “ I spent many years in New Zealand.”  He then asked if I was married.  I replied “Yes, not sure where this was taking me.”  He then proceeded to tell me that he had some very good stuff on the black market and if I wished I could buy my husband a good watch and myself a genuine Italian leather handbag.  I said that I was very interested and would get my husband and come back.  I took off like a rocket.  Went back to Rod and said he could go through and buy us something for lunch, I wasn’t going back in there.  Off he went to find some nice looking fruit.  Best fruit that we have had so far.  It all looks nice but not sweet as we are used to.  

Socca



 Socca is  the signature dish for this area.  This is a flat pancake like dish that is made from ground chickpea flour and of course olive oil.  It is eaten hot and was quite nice little bit chewy and quite oily.  Better than the Bouillibaise.  By this time it was time to catch the train and head for Pisa.  Our hotel room was up about 4 flights of stairs but once we got there we found a nice clean room with an ensuite.  These are not usual in Italy.  Most hotels have shared bathrooms.  We headed off to a restaurant for dinner and had lasagna and Rod had Swordfish Pasta.  Both yummy and for dessert we had Italian ice cream.  A lot creamier than London but not as nice as what we had in Nice.  

Three of the four buildings in Pisa

Early next morning we headed for the Leaning Tower.  Boy, I is really leaning.  It is quite amazing how much it does lean and the photos certainly don’t do it justice.  The tower is part of a large area which also has a church and ancient cemetery. 

One of the walls in the cemetry

 It took us several hours to wander around the cemetery as it was very old and again the tombs and tributes to the dead are quite magnificent.  As they were carrying out maintenance a few years ago they stumbled upon a false wall and behind it are these wonderful paintings.  They are now in the process of trying to recover all of the walls without doing damage.The huge cathedral is stunningly beautiful inside and next to it is a smaller chapel that has a magnificent dome on top that gives the building lovely acoustics.  

They keep the bones in chests
as a monument

We were fortunate enough to see about 100 priests enter the small chapel and they were there to begin a service.  Their singing was magnificent.  The clarity of their sound was so lovely.  A few other tourists managed to sneak in and one or two snuck photos although we were told quite clearly no photos.  They then proceeded out of the small chapel and into the cathedral where a longer service was held with loud speakers outside so we could again hear the beautiful singing.  

Have to pinch myself to make sure I am really here

By the time we were ready to get the train, the crowds had increased to thousands.  It was amazing.  The amount of people around and the market stalls selling all sorts of touristy things. 

Pizza in Pisa

 Some quite rude boxer shorts and postcards referring to the leaning tower and a warning not to let your monument droop.  We had just a short walk through narrow streets of rough cobblestones back to our hotel to pick up our bags and proceed to the station ready for Florence.

Just sitting back watching the world go by