It took us a couple days to catch on, enjoying the nice evening air flowing through the apartment. It was a quiet block, and contrary to what we had expected, the evenings were nice and refreshing and the humidity low. But Kiyomi kept waking up with more and more spots. At first, we thought a single mosquito got into her room and had a heck of a buffet. But it finally dawned on us, there are mossies in Italy. By the time we figured it out and closed the windows, Kiyomi had over 70 bites on her. This was not the best parenting moment of my mommy career, but really this wasn't the Whiteshell, it was a a medieval town. Apparently the wall could keep out invaders, but had no impact on mossies.
As we were nearby on Monday, we couldn't resist the call of the beach. Viareggio is a white sand beach town about a 25 minute drive from Lucca where the Italians head to vacation. If it isn't actually the Italian Riviera, it sure feels like it. The beach itself is actually quite nice; white, soft sand with a gentle pitch into the water. Don't expect peace and serenity however as every inch of the beach is claimed by what seemed like 100s of bagnio, private beaches lined with deck chairs and umbrellas. The bagnio are lined up side by side along the whole length of the beach, each demarcated by their respective colour of beach umbrella creating colourful slices. Most have little restaurant areas and some have pools, for which you pay extra to access. We expected it to be a total zoo crawling with summer revelers, but it was actually quite quiet and there was lots of space on the beach to play.
We elected the cheapest option of umbrella and a couple of beach chairs, and we were escorted to the back of the line of deck chairs dutifully taking our spot. Apparently the spots can be reserved for up to 3 days at a time, so I'm guessing getting near the water is highly unlikely. The kids set to work right away digging a big hole on the beach. I've come to the realization though that sandcastle making and hole digging is not something that Italian kids do; not only were none of them doing it, but a great many beach goers looked at us and the kids with perplexed curiosity as we embarked on our standard beach activity - dig a big hole in the sand and fill it with water. As with Cinque Terre, I also notice that 98% of the women on the beach wear bikinis. Young, old, skinny, larger, smooth or wrinkled skin - it made no difference, the bikini was the standard attire. Not for the first time, I wished that North American women shared the comfort and confidence in their bodies that Italian women have mastered.
The highlight of the day for me was heading up to the cantina around 5 to get a drink, and discovering that these wonderful cream filled donut like pastries had just arrived still warm from the baker. At first I thought they were standard fair, but when I went up 15 minutes later, they were all gone (and no, it wasn't to get a second one!). Despite the strangeness of having a beach overrun by lines of umbrellas, I did find there was something rather civilized about having comfy deck chairs, a little table, a beach umbrella and the ability to walk a few paces to grab lunch or a ice cream in a sand free cantina.
Tuesday was split between Lucca and Pisa, which is only a 20 minute drive away. In the morning we went in search of a couple of shops that we had wanted to explore, and, as had been planned by the original designers of these medieval cities, getting to your destination is never straight forward and you can find yourself waylaid. Of course, the designers were hoping to delay and confuse enemy invaders, now it just serves as an advantage to a town that caters to tourists trying to waylay them into stores and cafés. I actually met a shop keeper who had been born in Quebec, but moved to Italy when she was young. Despite having been in Italy for more that 35 years, she still proudly proclaimed herself to be a Quebecoise, and surprisingly still retained her accent when speaking French.
As a result of the shopping labyrinth, it was late afternoon before we arrived in Pisa to check out the infamous tower. It is rather amazing to me that an engineering error has effectively ensured the global notoriety of this otherwise non descript little town. We parked not far from the centro, and as per our guidebook instructions, got on a bus from this large parking area. What we didn't know is that the bus ride was all of 3 minutes! Needless to say, we walked back.
I will say that the Leaning Tower is indeed impressive to see, and you get to do it with obout 10,000 of your closest friends. It is not a quiet little out of the way tourist find that's for sure. It is a prime stop on the bus tour extravaganza. The Baptisty and Duomo are equally as impressive as the challenged tower, but somehow receive short shrift against the engineering oopsy.
That said, it is worth seeing and we dutifully made our rounds and took pictures with distorted perspective that make it look like the tower is being held up. I mean, really how can you come to Pisa and not? After getting the iconic shot, we spent a good 45 minutes playing some variation of ultimate freebie crossed with soccer, and using baseball cap for a ball. Not sure how it all came about, but the pictures from it are awesome, if a little less iconic. It also made me notice that there has been precious little accessible green space of our travels, with most lawns cordoned off.
Dinner in Pisa was at an Indian-Italian restaurant. After weeks of pasta and bread, the idea of curry and rice was appealing. We were, however, the only customers in the place. Made me wonder if Italians just don't really have any interest in ethnic food as we've seen very few restaurants that don't serve your Italian fare. Curiously, though it billed itself as an Indian-Italian restaurant, there wasn't a pizza or pasta on the menu, but the naan was tasty.
Wednesday, we headed into the hills of Tuscany...on horses. Yup, the Miller-Suzukis suited up and went a ridin'. While the route was not far, it was interesting to see the country from the back of a horse. Mia, Genevre, Indio and Bandito were kind to us as were the two guides who led the kids' horses. Although, my horse and I had a bit of an ongoing misunderstanding - I wasn't supposed to let her eat grass and she knew I had no idea what I was doing so snuck grass at every possible opportunity. I could see the appeal to traveling by horse back, that is until I dismounted and my thighs were screaming and I realized the amount of core strength needed to sit on a horse! According to Rossie, the owner of Lucca horseriding, riders are rather good at yoga and vice verse as both use similar muscles.
After our first menu oppsy at a little cafe crawling with lunching polizia (we ordered a pasta with shrimp, and only after thought to look up what the heck shrimp is in Italian), we were off to Assissi. Our place here is on the hillside between Assissi and Perugia and looks out over olive groves and the little hillside town of Assisi famous for its native son, St Francis. Arriving here in late afternoon gave us time to hit the local grocery store and have a little swim in the pool before a nice quiet home cooked meal in our little cottage. After weeks of travel, we are heading into our relaxation week, so here's hoping it will take and we will let ourselves slow down a wee little bit.
The parting shot tonight shows a cool shot of the iconic tower. Good night from Assissi.
No comments:
Post a Comment