Italy!

Conrad and I took a nice little trip to Italy. We had a great time! I am sure we consumed more pizza than one should ever consume in a week's time, but it was so good! We headquartered in a small city in central Tuscany, Montecatini. As soon as we arrived we hit the sights in Pisa. We had a rental car, so it was an experience to find the city center. We pretty much just went with logic, since the signage in Pisa was so poor.


We spent our second day in Florence. We visited the David, which was amazing! We also went to the Uffizi gallery. It was cool, but the amount of Renaissance artwork was overwhelming, and there really wasn't one "stand out" piece. Oh ya, we also got our first foreign parking ticket!

On the third day we took to the Tuscan countryside to go wine tasting. The first place we stopped was a family owned winery. The woman providing the tastings was about 65 years old and only spoke Italian. We tasted her wine as well as her olive oil. I thought the olive oil would be tasted with a piece of bread. Nope! She handed me a tablespoon full of oil. It was good, but makes me a little sick to think about now. ha ha. We visited two other wineries. The second was blah, and the woman seemed pretty annoyed that we were there to taste her wine. The last, was a beautiful winery on the mountainside. The guy helping us was so friendly and the wine was the best we tasted. Conrad and I both felt that three wineries were plenty, as all only tasted/sold Chianti wine. We spent the remainder of the afternoon in our little Montecatini.


Our fourth day was spent exploring the coast. We visited and had lunch in Livorno. Conrad had a really good seafood lunch. It was pretty funny because the shrimp he got looked huge, but they were whole shrimp, eyes and all. By the time he got to the tail to eat it, he had meat the size of my pinky fingernail. haha. After lunch we traveled South and hit the beach. Okay, we walked the beach in our clothes and hung out on the pier. =) It was so beautiful! That evening we went to Montecatini Alto, a small village near our hotel that had panoramic views of the city we were
staying in.

Our next day was spent at the golf course. It was so nice to take a break from driving. I actually didn't play, as it was too expensive for my "game". I love to golf, but I am not very good. lol! I walked the first eight holes with Conrad and then took to the poolside for an afternoon of laying out and reading. It was perfect!







We spent our last day in Lucca. What a cool place! The streets were intimate mazes with piazzas everywhere. From there we went into the nearby mountains and visited the coolest bridge ever!






















Overall, we had a fantastic time in Italy. We stayed the perfect amount of time, enjoyed the wine and enjoyed testing our Italiano skills. =)