Did you know there is a tower in Pisa that is leaning?

Well, there is! And did you know pickles come from cucumbers? They do! They really really do! So, we went to a little town called Pisa and checked out the cool tower that began sinking THE DAY THEY STARTED BUILDING IT! One would have thought that once they noticed that it was leaning, they might have said, "Whoa Guiseppe, let's put this sucka somewhere else!" But apparently in the 10th century, they didn't have a words to express such a concept. So they continued and about 400 years later, and several attempts at correcting the lean by skewing the tower in the opposite direction, they completed it. And it continued to lean, and lean, and lean more. In 1990, they took steps that may have at least slowed it down, but who knows? Anyway, the tower is part of the Duomo and we also checked out the church. Incredible weather. What a sky.

From Pisa, we went to Portovenere which is on the southern edge of the Cinque Terra. Lunch was great in this little fishing town. Very picturesque. Bright blue skies and plenty of fishing boats. Anyone remember the move version of Popeye with Robin Williams from way back in the 80's? Remember how everything looked cartoon-like and all the houses were jammed together and sort of crooked and all kinds of wacky colors. Well this is exactly what this place looks like and the same with the Cinque Terre towns.

And OKAY speaking of the Cinque Terre...OMIGosh no way were we prepared for how difficult this walking is. Hell, my (Jackie) left thigh is sore from the clutch in the Ford Fiesta...what was I thinking that I (let alone Jim!!) could walk between the five (that's what cinque means, btw 5!! freakin', kick-your-50-year-old outta shape fat ass) towns. Man!! Whew. So we came back to Lucca and went to our new favorite dinner restaurant (more on that later--this place deserves a it's very own headline on our blog) and ordered more pasta, cinghiale and vino.

We do love us some tuscan cuisine ;-)