30 July

Saturday 30 June 0700  Livorno, Italy Tyrrheman Sea

Livorno is the principal town in the region called Tuscany and the reason we are here is that is the port from which we can travel to Florence and Pisa.

Pisa was the first part of the trip for me and we boarded the bus for a 30 minutes trip to the town of Pisa.  I thought that the only thing there would be the ‘Leaning Tower of Pisa’ but I was wrong.  The historical site is gathered around the “Field of Miracles,” the Cathedral, Baptistery and the Bell Tower which is the one on the lean.  The bell tower is now inclined 14 feet to one side due to the settling of the subsoil, it is not the only one on a lean around Europe but certainly the most famous.

We then climbed on board the bus again and travelled over 1 hour to the city of Florence and started to walk through the old city.  Once again we were overwhelmed with dates, architects and beautiful buildings.  The day was hot and unfortunately all we wanted to do was stop and sit down in the shade and have a cold drink but this was not on the schedule.  While we were walking through the centre of the city, it seemed that they were having a Ferrari exhibition and they were driving these beautiful cars around the city square.

A further walk through the city we entered into the Pantheon which is a well preserved 2^nd Century temple which was built to hour the Roman gods, the Pantheon serves as the final resting place of many Renaissance figures.  The original temple was built in 27 BC, King Hadrian added the enormous dome in 120 AD.  This is a huge area and they are continually digging up new ruins.  They have dug down about 10 metres and they just keep finding more ancient temples. It is hard to describe what you see as it so overwhelming and the numbers of years and figures become blended into one. This is another great spot to spend more time next time when I come back.

I think this is certainly one of the highlights of my trip.

A very late lunch followed and then a trip back to the ship and most people were in bed early as we had another shore day the next day and a lot of people were getting very tired.

Back on board and I sat outside on the top deck and read in the sun and waited for the ship to sail and even though it was still light, I went into the dining room for a bowl of soup and a roll and then off to bed.