Author: Jennifer Smith
Locals & Locales
A trip up into the vineyards. This is the true Tuscany. Everywhere large, colourful mansions dot the hillsides, overlooking their expanses of neatly terraced vineyards or olive groves … almost overlapping with their neighbours. Tall, dark pencils of cypresses accentuating…
Viareggio
Well, we HAD planned to catch the Lucca Saturday market before we left. The website said it closed at one, but stalls were packed and gone before noon. So … onto plan B. Black thunder clouds were gathering behind us…
Pisa – The City
That’s the trouble with having a train station mere minutes away … it’s so easy to leave things to the last minute! “Did you feel like going to Pisa this morning?” asked Glen (it was 10:20, the train left at…
Bridges and Villages
Buses and trains are wonderfully efficient, but if you want to do more than one place in a day, a car is the answer. We have a little Fiat 500 in dark petrol blue … cute as a button ……
Firenze (Florence)
Since that first hiccup on Sicily, the public transit has been incomparable. Buses and trains have been on time, efficient, fast … and go EVERYWHERE … even tiny mountain villages of half a dozen houses. Canada please note!!! This was…
Cinque Terre
Rick Steeves probably has a lot to answer for! When he first wrote about this region decades ago, they were five, sleepy unknown villages perched on cliffs overlooking the ocean just north of Viareggia and La Spessia. Today, there are…
Pisa
A mere 20 minutes away by train. Figuring a weekday might be a little less crowded (we’d read all those horror reviews!) and with trains going every hour or so, we booked for 10:42 am, then casually strolled the four…
Lucca
Worlds apart from intense and frenetic Naples, Lucca is tranquil and serene by comparison. Travel yesterday was agreeably smooth and uneventful … trains left on time and were barely full. Daniele met us on the platform as the train pulled…
Onwards to Naples
We knew it was going to be a tiring day of travel. The Regional Train to Messina was packed with people travelling home for Easter gatherings … huge foil-wrapped chocolate Easter Eggs and fancily wrapped packages were carried carefully and…
Taormina, and ….
We lucked out today … the mist and wind of yesterday — gone. It had been fun on the Lime electric scooters the evening before… whizzing down the bike lane … hats and hair flying. Till we got to the…