Holiday Post 5 - Florence and Lucca

Lol, started writing all this and then realised that some of my photos are of different things and places to what I remember. So, as friends, I ask you to bear with me re the vagueness of details. If I say that the below structure is of the Eiffel Tower THEN IT IS! lol

Going from Rome to Florence was a nice change cause Florence is a city on a much smaller scale and also less urban. From Florence we got a day trip to visit the Eiffel Tower below (also known colloquially as the Leaning Tower of Pisa! lol).

One thing I noticed about Florence as well as many other Italian towns was that nearly everyone rides a motorbike rather than car. They were parked EVERYWHERE in Florence and Rome.Florence had fantastic markets and I was constantly tempted to buy leathergoods, but kept holding out for what I considered would be the "holy grail" of handbags. I couldnt decide whether I preferred to buy a purple bag or a tan coloured one, let alone decide on style, so in the end I didnt buy something until the last day of my travels in Venice. And btw - I decided on TAN!
Heaps of souveniers in Florence and my mum was constantly searching for postcards to send to people. She sent some to people every day and sometimes asked me to help... In the end I was writing so often I had to say things like... discovered where the local toilet was today. Got a little tedious. lol

I took many, many photos of windows throughout Italy. The only thing I seemed to take more photos of was bicycles! There were so many bikes across parts of Italy that it was near impossible NOT to include one in photos. So below are a collection of my "bike shots". I can see a 2009 Bikes of Italy Calendar coming along! lol.

The above photo was lovely cause our guide told us that someone had put the ribbons on the house to congratulate the owners who just had twins. It was an old tradition.

Lucca was an amazing town and we stayed 3 nights in a lovely apartment. My mum and I shared with 2 other guys in their 20s. Lucca is all contained within tall brick walls that you can walk and cycle on. Its quite small, quaint and usually quite, HOWEVER... the time we were there was the annual Comic Book Festival which brought 1000s of tourists into town. Was so funny to see people all dressed in costumes during our stay. I was even stopped from walking one day to allow for the Storm Troopers procession below! lol

Was tempted to buy a costume of my own.... very tempted.... lol

Above is a photo of the "wall" that we intially went bike riding over. Its such a wide wall that its hard to imagine it as such. We then set off from the town to the tuscan countryside where we rode for about 10kms. Was fantastic getting out in the country and a pity I didnt take more photos of the amazing scenery. I did, however take the below few second video.

After riding through the countryside we were heading back through the main roads when alas, I lost my balance and fell from my bike - aghhhh. Managed to escape with bruises and minor cuts, but did freak me out about falling near cars, cause I only ride offroad in Sydney.

We also visited one of the most reputable producers of wine in Lucca and had wine sampling. I am certain now that I just dont have a taste for wine when after tasting the "cream of their crop" which was about 7 samples of award winning wine, I couldnt differentiate the taste. All tasted like sour grapes to me. And whats with the rediculous descriptions people give to their wine. The lady running the vineyard tour was saying... "you will note the woody textures....." what the hell.... I dont note anything between one and the other. They all taste bad to me! lol