Cinque Terre to Pisa

We got up early Saturday morning to visit our final site in the Cinque Terre -- the castle on the ridge literally just above our room. The bright, sunny day provided a beautiful panorama of Vernazza and the surrounding hills and sea. We're sad to leave, but know we'll be back.

We caught the local train to La Spezia where we connected to a regional train for Pisa. It's a holiday weekend in Italy (WWI Liberation Day) and the train was packed! For most of the trip we didn't get beyond the vestibule. At each stop more people boarded until we could barely move. Fortunately it's only an hour to Pisa.

In Pisa, we took the local bus to the Field of Miracles, the location of the Tower, Duomo, etc. We had been warned how touristy it was. There were tacky souvenier stands lining the walks.

We walked across the entire area in search of a WC. (Italians must not drink much as toilets are scarce.) Fortunately, the far side of the square was much less crowded. We found a nice little cafe in view of the tower where we enjoyed Foccacia Caperse (with cheese & tomatos) while we read about the re-engineering of the tower.

We decided not to climb to the top of the tower as it was a 2 hour wait. Instead we chose to tour the Duomo. The architecture of the buildings is called Pisan Romanesque. The carved white marble almost looks like lace. We must be becoming Duomo snobs. We both agreed the interior of this one was not impressive.

At this point we'd had enough of Pisa. It was back to the train station for the 1/2 hour trip to Lucca.

Stay tuned,
Barb