From Le Grazie to Pisa!

Phew!  How time flies when you're having fun!

We've been busy exploring the Ligurian coast and now the Tuscan coast is opening up its treasures to us!

May have to do this write up in more than one internet cafe visit, bear with us - after all we're here to see the world that we're visiting!

So, we left Santa Margherita after a pleasant stay... and headed off to Le Grazie... a base for some wonderful exploring of the area. Le Grazie is a small village near La Spezia and many other wonderful towns and villages - the descriptions that follow are from our land adventures (we traveled by bus and train.)

La Spezia

Kyra and Rick:

We went to La Spezia on a Sunday to visit several museums... they were all open... but the town was closed! The city has over a 100 000 people and almost all of them stayed home.  There was virtually no traffic and none of the stores were open.  But we didn't mind, we were there for the museums!

We first went to the Naval museum.  They had a big collection of original figureheads, and lots of amazing models.  There were all sorts of artefacts.  Rick was a very willing teacher, and Kyra, a keen student.  I now know the difference between a yawl, a schooner, and ketch - and I'm developing my sailing vocabulary! 

We then moved on the the museum of Modern Art - Rick's favourite sculpture was a series of 7 metronomes set sequentially at different speeds - the best place to stand was in front of the third metronome from the right!  I liked a variety of sculptures, some of which made me think of theatre set designs.

Onward to the Museum of Fine Art - a wide array of displays - illuminated manuscripts, religious artefacts, venetian paintings, etc...

We finished the day, with a visit at the citadel St Giorgio, which housed an archeological museum - we're getting to know our Roman artefacts!

Cinque Terre

July 17th, was Rick and I's 7th wedding anniversary - and what better way to spend our day than to explore this cluster of quaint coastal villages on the Ligurian coast...   We should actually call it quattro Terre, as we made it to 4 of the 5 villages (but added an inland village as we hiked throught the olive groves and vineyards). (We did anchor near Monterosso for a night (before Le Grazie).  Cinque Terre is a national park and protected by Unesco.

Riomaggiorre:  Our first village of the day - we explored the streets and many stairs crammed between buildings and marvelled at the scenery.

Manarola: We walked to Manarola using the Via del Amore - an easy 1km path joining the two towns, then we made up for it by hiking into the mountains behind the village, to Groppo where we were greeted with a breathtaking view of the Med and surrounding mountains and villages - what a great reward after a hot climb in the sun!  We treated ourselves to lunch (Rick tried the local favourite - an anchovy panini, and yes, he did like it!)  We then lept into the sea - in this neat swimming area surrounded by rocky outcrops - so refreshing!  Then we hiked on the the next town.

Corniglia - we followed a coastal path to Corniglia, and found ourselves at the bottom of  367 stairs... the village is perched on a cliff hundreds of feet above the sea... we rewarded our efforts with a pair of gelatos while exploring nooks and crannies.

Vernazza - a lovely port village where we finished off the day with a delicious Italian dinner at a restaurant on the harbour piazza... our waiter was more Italian than Italian!

Porto Venere

The next day, we took it easy on the boat, did some laundry (who would have thought it would be so Zen to do your laundry in a bucket on deck... ) Then, we went off to Porto Venere and discovered a great castle that Rick and I took much pleasure in exploring (you'll see pictures soon, we promise!) We explored the town at a very relaxed pace (still recovering from the hiking, stairclimbing of the day before!)  We figured that since we now knew the bus routes and the town next to our anchorage... it was time to move on!  Pisa was next on the list, as long as the wind cooperated - it was a fair distance away (by sailboat, that is). 

 Pisa

If you know your geography, Pisa is inland from the Med, via a river - we sailed to the mouth of the Arno River, and motored our way up the river to a little marina.  From there, we would be able to access Pisa (and that famous leaning tower) by bus...  The river felt so different from the sea, we felt like we were in another world...

Our first evening there, Rick and I left Barbara relaxing on the boat, and went for our first exploration of Pisa.  We found a pedestrian street that we followed to the river, crossed a bridge and a little further along discovered the piazza where the leaning tower, museums, cathedral and baptistry live.  We wandered around the manicured lawns and took it all in; after a pasta dinner, we went home.

We did a proper exploration of Pisa the next day, it was pretty cool - man, the Italians take their religious buildings very seriously!  It has been very fascinating - Rick and I both share a keen interest in architecture.   For lunch, we went to an alimentari (grocery store), picked up some fruit, bread and prosciutto cruddo (yum) and had a picnic next to the cathedral, followed by a siesta, right there on the lawn with some other 30 or so exhausted and hot tourists.

The next day we took the train to Florence (Firenze, in Italy) - we'll write more about Firenze, after we've gone back on the 3rd for some serious art appreciation!  This was our introduction to the famous city - let's just say I caused a traffic jam that resulted in a collision with other tourists when I was stopped in my tracks by the incredible Duomo - unreal... will tell you more later...

When we returned to the Marina that night, we met a new addition to our  crew (who would be sailing with us for the next 4 days): Samantha from Sacramento - we were all happy to welcome someone new on the boat, and enjoyed getting to know her as she braved sea sickness the next day, on our first half of our journey to the island of Elba.  We stopped in Medici (pronounced Medici) for the night in a very new and swanky port (no personality at all, but hey, showers on shore are a luxury we do enjoy now and then!  The rest of the time we use our solar shower on deck).  The next day, with Samantha on motion sickness pills (and much happier), we headed toward Elba, the lovely Italian island where Napoleon was exiled (poor fellow).  Will tell you more about Elba on our next entry.

Photos to be added later