Cruising Days 2-5

Cruising Day 2 – Day of Italian Riviera

It only took us forty-three years to get here from the time we first talked about it. It was definitely worth the wait. Portofino is a charming little town in a string of charming little towns along the coast. We visited three villages on the Riviera – Portofino, Santa Margherita, and Rapallo. There are 16^th century castles (fortresses) sprinkled along the coast even more frequently than villages, reminding us that Italy, until the middle of the 19^th century, was a collection of tiny city-states. The coast often attracted Saracen (Arabian) pirates, and the castles gave the city-states some chance at fending off the marauders.

These charming villages are filled with beautiful homes painted bright colors with decorations surrounding the windows, made to look like carved marble frames. In earlier days, you announced your success by the outside of your home – if you had carved marble frames around doors and windows, you were very successful. Those who weren’t quite as successful had their houses painted to look like there were carved marble frames, and one really can’t tell the difference until one is pretty close up. Perception is reality, I guess. This area is beautiful to see, but there isn’t much to do beyond walk around and enjoy the sights, which we did. And there was gelato, of course.

Day 3 – Pisa, Florence, and very sore feet.

We were supposed to be in the port of Livorno when we woke up, but we were late getting in. After waiting around for an hour for our tour to start, we got onto a big tour bus and headed up the road. Our tour guide was a young woman from Livorno who filled us in on the rivalry between Livorno and Pisa. I think it goes back for a long time, but now is mostly based on football – Livorno has a class A team, while Pisa has only a class B team. She was gloating. Then she told us how there are many jokes told about Pisans such as “Why can’t you play Hide and Seek with Pisans? No one will look for them.” In any case, she was a fun tour guide for the day. We visited the square in Pisa where there is a great cathedral, baptistery, and the famous tower. Wherever there is a cathedral from the fifteenth or sixteenth century, there will also be a baptistery. It is a grand domed building near the cathedral. We were told that one couldn’t enter a cathedral or church until one became a Christian and that happened in the baptistery. (Somehow I think the masons made up that rule for job security.) The tower really does lean severely. The guide said the top of the tower is 15 feet off the vertical axis – a five-degree angle. They’ve built a railing around the base that, I think, makes it look like it leans more than it really does, but still it’s pretty surprising how far it does lean. The decorative carvings around all the buildings are really astounding, and, if I ever figure out how to put pictures in my blog, you can see for yourself! I’m working on it.

We went on to Florence and had about three hours to look around. It’s not enough, unless you have blisters on your feet as I do, then it’s too much. Now let me mention about “On-Your-Own Tours.” When you sign up for your tours from the ship, keep this little phrase in mind. What it means is the bus will drop you some way from where the sights are – usually they say a ten-minute walk. It’s a ten minute walk if you have been in training for several months, as the tour guide you’re trying to keep up with has been. When you get where you will start and end the tour, they hand you a poorly-drawn map and send you on your way. We walked and walked, but there is just so much to see. Again, the architecture here is extraordinary. It is a beautiful city and rather overwhelming in how much there is to see. It was a Saturday and we were told that we wouldn’t be able to get tickets to get into any of the major museums, so I guess we will have to come back another time! There was still a lot of fun and interesting things we could see. There is a great cathedral and baptistery here with a tower, but this tower is standing straight. These buildings are all faced with an extraordinary mosaic of white, pink, and green marble – all of which come from this region. It’s a little busy for my taste, but the Florentines love it. There is an exact copy of the David (the real one is in one of those museums we couldn’t visit) in one of the piazzas in Florence, along with some other huge and wonderful sculptures. When we arrived in the square, there was a parade going on. All the people were in period costumes from the sixteenth century and marched in with great pomp and flair to drummers accompanying the parade. The guide told us there are a lot of little local things like this going on. She had no idea what it was for, but it was fun for us to see. We had a nice lunch in a little café and, of course, found a gelateria just before we had to take the long walk back to the bus.

Day 4 – Tuscany!

My favorite day so far. Dave and I have talked a lot about how we feel like we’ve seen Rome and have no real desire to return, that Florence was interesting, but we probably wouldn’t be upset if we never returned, but Tuscany is amazing and we will be back. We’d like to spend a week or two just roaming around the area. We drove about two hours into the countryside winding up narrow roads (in a huge tour bus – Yikes!) to a town called San Gimignano – an absolute gem of sixteenth-century Tuscany. The ride there was like riding through a picture postcard album. Every turn brought another breathtaking sight. Some people refer to San Gimignano as the tower town, as it has several tall stone towers that make it recognizable from quite a distance. If I were going to make a remake of Romeo and Juliet, this is where I would film. The narrow cobblestone streets worm their crooked ways between charming stone buildings and it would be very easy to get lost (as we did later that day in another town!). We didn’t really want to leave, but we had an appointment at a small winery nearby for lunch.

When we arrived, we sat in a small courtyard under a canopy. While we were there, we were treated to a nice little show of lightning and thunder, something we Californians don’t see often. We were immediately served plates of pecchorini cheese (okay, I have no idea how to spell that!), thin slices of some wonderful spicy sausage, and crusty bread soaked with extra virgin olive oil. I always thought extra virgin olive oil was the first pressing, but it turns out it means it was pressed within 48 hours of when the olives were harvested. And they are not allowed to shake the trees to get the olives as that will bruise them. They have to brush the olives out of the trees so they will fall more gently, and they put something like parachutes under the trees to catch them, so they don’t fall onto the ground. We assumed we would taste a couple of wines – tiny tastes as they do in Napa and Sonoma – but we ended up tasting about nine wines, each, it seemed, better than the one before, and the portions were generous. About halfway through the tasting, we were brought something called ribollite, a dish made of white beans, spinach, carrots, and some other things. I’ve got to find a recipe. It doesn’t sound like much, but it was great. Our host said his mother made it fresh that day, but we didn’t get to see Mama, and I somehow doubt he had his mother slaving over a hot stove in the kitchen. But it was homemade and delicious. We also tasted their extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and their truffle olive oil. Great stuff. Our charming and funny host told us his family had lived on this land, making wine and olive oil there since 1720. He gave us wine tasting lessons and, even though I thought I pretty much knew all about it, I learned some things. (Their web site is www.torciano.com. I haven’t looked at it yet, so I don’t know just what you’ll find.) The wine was great, the food was great, and the company was even better. Reluctantly, we left and wended our way to another gem of a town called Volterra.

Volterra was another charming little town on a hilltop, similar to San Gimignano, but without all the towers. Our tour guide handed us over to another tour guide who was more familiar with this town. He led us around the twisty streets to the church, baptistery, and tower (each town has at least one set of these) and gave us a tour of the beautiful little church. Then we stopped by an alabaster shop. The tour guide explained all the different types of alabaster and showed us their many uses. If I’d wanted to spend a lot of money, I could have done so there. Some of the things were extraordinarily beautiful. Anyway, Dave and I decided we needed to find bathrooms before we left and had about 20 minutes before the bus was to leave. It was a tiny town. No problem, right? We headed off and before we could turn around and go back, we were good and lost. Every way we turned looked familiar and yet unfamiliar at the same time. After about ten minutes of wandering, I was starting to panic, but we found someone else from the tour who pointed us in the right direction. We found bathrooms, gelato (of course!), and got to the bus on time. We had spent a lot of time walking, but I wasn’t as bothered by my sore feet as usual. I guess when you are having a great time, you forget about your feet, and all of Tuscany was a great time.

Day 5 – At sea

Today is a day to rest, catch up, get things posted, and have a little vacation. I finished reading Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert a couple of days ago and recommend it to all the women out there. It’s a chick book, but a really good one. Today I finished Grift Sense by James Swain. If you like light mysteries, you’ll like James Swain. His books all have a gambling theme, interesting characters, and are fun. Next up – Dennis Lahane’s Darkness, Take my Hand. I’ll let you know how it is, but Dennis Lahane is always a treat. It’s nice to have time to just read what I like and not what I have to read. Retirement is good, vacationing is better, but, Boy, Howdy, we miss our kids and grandkids! I’m getting ready to borrow a small child for a while just to get some hugging in!