FRENCH DOORS

The doors and doorways of Villefranche were so lovely with their faded, peeling paint. Why is it that we paint our doors so often and insist that they be pristine?? Just a rhetorical question for you to ponder. These are the doors and doorways that we found so fascinating as well as a couple of just plain beautiful pictures. I just love the ochre and terra cotta colors of the stucco, don't you?

Perfect color combination, n'est-ce pas?

The quintessential Villefranche street scene.

Later,
Janet

PRETTY PISA PURCHASE

Look what I found for 5 Euro ( less than $6.50) from a street vendor in Pisa ( who looked pretty legit). Great on the table, and it will cover the mismatched leaves when they are in the table. The colors are perfect for my dining room and the paisley theme reinforces the curtain fabric. I am kicking myself for not buying several ( there were so many beautiful colors and designs) to hang on the back of comfy chairs, swag over a curtain rod or if I had the confidence to pull it off I could even buy one to wear! I just love it!

Later,
Janet

THE TOWER THAT TILTS

Not something you would see just anywhere...

The original plan was not to go to Florence, but to go to a small walled city named Lucca about half way to Florence. I had done some research and it seemed very doable in the amount of time that we had. Then Bob mentioned the Tower in Pisa, you know the one?? Since Pisa was on the way we decided we would take the train to Pisa ( from Livorno where we docked for Florence which is about 1 1/2 hours away by train), explore and then go on to Lucca if time permitted. I am sure I have told you multiple times that I spent a lot of time on the Cruise Critic boards and forums getting ideas. The word seemed to be "don't bother with Pisa, there is nothing there but the tower in a field". But once again we decided to judge for ourselves and found Pisa to be a delightful city with wonderful shops, a bakery ( yum) and great buildings. We wandered around and headed toward the tower. Obviously signs for the tower are pretty easy to understand and the walk was pleasant.

This is the day that was supposed to be 74 degrees and rainy. It actually sprinkled for about 5 minutes and that was it! Wonderful weather.

Approaching..it really does look more than a bit odd.

You can buy a ticket to climb the tower, but there was a wait of two or three hours. The tower is in a large park with several other buildings, lots of souvenir type stalls around the edge and many many people posing with the tower in the background.

We saw the sights, ate lunch around the corner with a view of the tower. Pizza again!

No time for Lucca, but we had a really fun time just wandering about Pisa and taking the train and bus back to the ship.

Next time I will tell you about Villefranche, France and then sadly, our trip will be over.

Later,
Janet

THE ETERNAL CITY

Rome was the only "Ship Excursion" that we took. Because Rome does not have a harbor, ships must dock about 60 miles inland in Civitivecchia. We were fearful of taking the train to Rome, getting lost and missing the boat ( quite literally) and we had quite a few "shipboard credits" with which to pay for this particular trip. We didn't do a tour, but just took the bus, with guide, that was provided to Rome. We were supposed to get there by 10:00 and meet for the return at 4:15. Clearly not a lot of time and we didn't get to St Peter's Square until after 11:00 because of horrible trafffic. The next 20 minutes were spent in line, with legs crossed, waiting for my turn at the, you guessed it, Ladies Room. I was in dire need and was most annoyed when the women in front of me twice let 4 women cut in line. Believe me, I was mumbling for sure. Of course there was no line for the men's room so Bob wandered off to start the photo journal. Our plans for today were to see St Peters Basilica and Piazza Navona. Anything else would just be icing on the cake. We spent a couple of hours in and around St Peters where Bob literally took hundreds of pictures and then wandered off to catch the Hop On Hop Off bus. I had purchased the tickets before I left home to make sure that I had them. Silly waste of time! There are several HO HO ( sounds like a bus of prostitutes or evil Santas, huh?...but HOHO is what they are refered to) bus lines in Rome. The problem is the traffic congestion. Once on, we only wanted to go two stops to the Piazza Navona for lunch and it took over 45 minutes. Any hopes of seeing P.N and then riding the bus to get an overview of the city were dashed. But that was OK, remember this was a stress free vacation. We had a pizza lunch ( again) , explored the Piazza and then wandered back to St Peters on some lovely side streets. Oh and we stopped for gelato and cappucino on the way. Day done, back to the bus in plenty of time to wait for 4 people who had to be found and brought back. Bet their day was not stress free although they showed no signs of humiliation when they finally got on the bus. I personally would have been mortified.

All pictures are in and around Piazza Navona and leaving St Peters.

Fountain at St Peter's Square ( Piazza St Pietro)

Leaving the square at the Vatican Gate

Bouganvilla (sp), just like SoCal

See what I mean, congested ( and very noisy city).

Perpendicular as well as parallel parking

Love these trees, I think I read that they are called Umbrella Pines

Beautiful apartment buildings near Castelo St Angelo

Castelo St Angelo

Ponte St Angelo

Love the chapeau.. how do you say "hat" in Italian?

My very favorite Rome picture

I had a wonderful tourist map of Rome. It didn't have every street on it, but it had small drawings and comments. We wandered the street which the map indicated "was a small, narrow street filled with antique shops". Beautiful!

That's it for Rome. Join me in a day or two for Pisa, leading up to the grand finale...Villefranche.

Later,
Janet