Off to Pisa

Last day, up packed what a struggle knew we were well overweight so took a box of P’s paperwork to the post office $60 to post to UK aarrghhh prob less as excess baggage.

In the car waved by to the Abbey, dropped of the printer and left over food ,cleaning stuff etc to K at the Museo and away. Rather funnily the great navigator took us to where he knew the road joined the one we wanted and away we went , after 5 minutes were back outside the Museo, this was the right road we just had gone and joined it further back, did laugh.
Decided to pay the toll and take the Autosrada (A1) making sure we got an on ramp ticket this time.
Was an easy drive skirted the outskirts of Rome, past the turnoff to Viterbo ( Bagnaia) where we stayed on the way in and finally a stop in Siena.
A lovely city huge gates and walls, with a massive piazza with tourists all round the edges in cafes hiding from the midday sun. Wandered about the narrow paved streets admiring the churches, one had a body in a glass case under one of the altars. This city has a horse race through the streets each year, a recreation of a medieval event, the different areas of the city support different riders and they fly flags on all the buildings.

Back in the car and a lot of driving going no where until we managed to find a road going in the right direction, and it turned out to be the one we wanted. Sadly we lost it again and ended up on windy roads, the upside was we were now in Tuscany and there scenery was lovely, the typical big villas and vineyards.

Made it safely to Pisa and followed signs to find a hotel for the night, they have a really good system of street signs with a list of hotels their star rating and direction to get to them. We followed a 2 star sign and found our selves in the middle of Pisa old town found the Leonardo hotel checked the price, and then checked a B & B up the next alley. A woman yelled out the window to me and I dragged myself up 4 flights of stairs to a large area with bedrooms and sitting room. The bed room she showed me had 4 beds including our one which was 2 pushed together. The “bathroom” was behind a screen and there was no carpark. Think the other one was better. Went back and signed in. The room was up on the 3rd floor and was a maze to get to it, the owner had bought half a second palace ( as they call the houses) and the stairs wound round the other tenants.
It was a lovely room big bed, painting on the wall and a new bathroom. Lovely view over the rooftops of Pisa.
Left the bags and headed off to see the Tower, last time I was in Pisa I left Shirley at the railway station and I ran through the streets to the Tower, went oh ar, and then ran back, having a very unpleasant encounter with gypsies who tried to rob me on the way.
This time was a much better experience, the Tower looked very leany the Duomo (Church) very big and the whole area very nice. Sadly we had arrived at sunset and it was a bit dark for good photos, we tried to take one of us but after missing our heads, a lovely view of P running to be in a time delay shot, we got someone to take on of us.
The full moon came up and we tried for some arty shots but only had the little camera so not great.
We then wandered back through the narrow streets and piazzas looking for somewhere fo a meal. Nice walk, warm evening and we checked out eh view from the bridge. ( good amount of bug spray on first to avoid being eaten alive)
Found a back street restaurant and had a bottle of Chianti from a local vineyard and I had a vege pizza and he had rabbit pasta. A nice crème brulee for me and a choc pudding with yummy choc in middle for him. Finally time for a sleep .
Up for a breakfast buffet ( nice plums ) and off to the airport where they did not care that our bags were overweight, or home many there were or whether we had our toiletries in clear bags etc , all those annoying things they just overlooked.
And then on to the EasyJet and away.