Western Mediterranean Cruise - Tuscan Region

Livorno was our third port, and final stop in Italy. It's located near the incredible city of Florence, but since we had visited there before on our last trip, we decided to see the Tuscan towns of Siena and San Gimignano instead. We had another driver today and enjoyed the trip out. This part of Italy is full of castles, villas, vineyards, olive groves and rolling green hills as far as the eye can see - BEAUTIFUL! Sadly all my dad's notes and researches on these cities was taken off a table in the library by another passenger while we were playing games, but he still a great job directing us around from memory.

The drive out to Siena took almost 2 hours so we took a couple breaks on the way to stretch our legs and look at the countryside. On our way out we also learned several things from our driver like Lucca is the best city in Italy (his hometown), and in Pisa they do everything wrong. 

When we arrived in Siena we made our way to the historic city center, known as the Piazza del Campo, that dates back to the 12th century. The Piazza is the site of the famous Palio, a bareback horse race. There were a bunch of school children there walking through displays of projects other students had made about Siena and the Piazza. I loved looking at them and took a couple photos of my favorite ones. We climbed the Torre del Mangia bell tower, which was completed in 1348. The reward for climbing up the 400 tower steps is views of the entire city and surrounding countryside.

Arriving in Siena!

We passed some amazing window displays on our walk through town

The Piazza del Campo

The tower we were about to climb

The Palio horse races

Halfway up the tower looking down on the Piazza

Great views from the top!

We also walked through the Siena Cathedral, one of the finest Gothic churches in Italy. The floors are all marble mosaics, some dating back to the 14th century. Equally impressive are the painted ceilings and domes and the banded light/dark marble columns.

I loved this organ with the trumpets

Some of the amazing floor mosaics

I even found one with my name!

From Siena it was another hour drive to the walled city of San Gimignano. We stopped at a little walled city on our way there and I can't remember what it was called, but it had an incredible vineyard in front. San Gimignano is known for it's well preserved towers. We climbed one for great views of the city. We also stopped for a treat at the Gelataria Dondoli, voted the world's best gelato!

First sighting of San Gimignano and it's towers

We bought Dave's mom a hand painted bowl here and took a picture in front of the shop

Looking down one of the streets

Our driver told us about this Gelateria that was voted the "World's Best." The lines were long, but we got some and it was oh so delicious. 

Views from our second tower climb

Even though it had already been a long day and we still had an hour and half drive back to the coast, we couldn't leave without a quick stop in Pisa. Our driver had a curfew so he only gave us 30 minutes there, but I was glad we got to go. We tried to see if we could climb the famous leaning tower, but they control the times people can go up and down and our window wasn't long enough to accomplish that. We did tour the baptistery next door and took some fun photos with the tower.

Recreating some photos from 11 years ago :)

Western Mediterranean Cruise - Rome

There is no place in the world quite like Rome. It's a magnificent city with pieces of history everywhere you turn. It's impossible to see all the sites in a day, but we tried to at least hit the highlights We had a private van again to take us around the city and our driver did a great job getting us through chaos so efficiently. He also had lots of great knowledge to share and even took us to a couple places not on our hit-list that were fun and different.

First stop was the Colosseum - the site of epic gladiator contests and other battles. Construction began in 72 AD and took just 8 years to complete. It was in continuous use for over 400 years until the fall of the Roman Empire. 

The Colosseum has been damaged several times by fire, earthquakes, wars, and looters (all those holes in the wall are where the iron supports were removed in the Middle Ages), but it still stands! It's crazy to think this structure is almost 2000 years old!

As the largest amphitheater ever constructed, the Colosseum had seating for 80,000 people. Much of the interior has been destroyed, but it's still an impressive site.

Next up our driver too us to the Knights of Malta Keyhole where we had a perfect view of St. Peter's Dome. I tried to take a picture with my cell phone, but it didn't work very well. I included a photo from Google that better shows what we saw at the end of the hedges. 

From there we went Capitoline Hill, which was designed by Michelangelo, and is one of the Seven Hills of Rome. We also had views of the Roman Forum below and found one the many drinking fountains that are scattered around the city. The water is supplied by aquifers and actually tastes pretty good!

Our driver had to really fight the crowds to get us up to the Pantheon, and on the way we heard his many opinions about different cultures (Mexicans are always late, there are too many Koreans, northern Italians work to much and we call them Germans, everyone from Naples is crazy, etc...) Unlike the Colosseum, the Pantheon is one of the best preserved Ancient Roman buildings and still features the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome, even though it's over 2,000 years old.

We then fought even more crowds to get to the Trevi Fountain. When we were last here 11 years ago there were some tourists, so we were shocked at the difference. The crowds were at least 10 rows deep and we were not able to get very close. All those people bring in a lot of money though as the fountain collects around 3,000 Euro each day!

At the Fountain in 2017

At the Fountain in 2006

And now it was time for lunch. The Spanish Steps, so named because the Spanish Embassy is nearby, was the perfect spot for a break. After eating we ran to the bottom and counted the steps on our way back up - 135 to be exact!

We had a quick stop at the Piazza Navona, which used to be flooded for mock naval battles hundreds of years ago. We walked around and admired the center fountain, which was designed by Bernini and also the fountain in the Angels & Demon film where they try to drown one of the four Preferiti. 

Our final stop was a guided tour of the Vatican Museum followed by a walk through St. Peter's Bascilica. Sadly pictures of the Sistine Chapel are not allowed, but it was, of course, incredible! St. Peter's is absolutely enormous (largest Christian church in the word) and every surface, including the floors and ceilings, are elaborately decorated. It's definitely an amazing site. 

We learned on our tour that even though ceiling in this hall looks molded, it's flat and the texture comes from very fancy paint work!

The Pieta Renaissance sculpture by Michaelangelo

The Altar

Looking up the dome