Lucca + Pisa

Friday we went to the beautiful city of Lucca.

Just when I think Italy can't get much more fantastic than what I've already found, I find something better. I'd never heard of Lucca and it was almost felt like just another field trip as we got up at 6am (Or maybe 6:15... if you're me) to get jump the 7:09 train to Florence where we'd transfer to the Lucca train. I had no idea how much I would fall in love with this city.

It started off on an interesting note when we arrived and stopped in the station's bathroom before going into the city. To the surprise of every single girl in the group, the toilet was pretty much just a porcelain hole in the floor that some water ran into when you flushed. I have to say, bathrooms are the most unpredictable part of Italy. You really never know what to expect. And for the record, I did use it. As Kelly, a girl in our class, said, "It's just like camping."

It did get better after that though. There was a beautiful church around every corner and we tried to go in all of them. Lunch was really good. I got risotto yet again, my new favorite, and finished with the best tiramisu I've had ever. Then we ran around to some more churches, climbed a tower with trees growing out of it, and five of us checked into our hostel, which turned out to be very nice. Lucca is about three hours by train total from Castiglion, and Pisa is another 30 minutes. Since we came that far for class, we opted to spend the night in Lucca so we could travel to Pisa the next day. This was an excellent choice.

After checking in, we decided to go shopping, something we normally avoid due to be scant on time. However, we had the whole evening and we'd already been to see the architecture. Plus, Lucca is filled with tons of fun little shops all within perfect walking distance of our hostel. So, we just had fun, running around and looking at things. We had a good dinner which included wine and more tiramisu (Kelly and I are both big fans, as I know my family is too!).

Everything was pretty much closed after dinner (the Italians close up shop around 8pm and eat dinner late) so we headed back to the hostel and pretty much just had fun staying up talking and being silly. It was so much fun just to kick back and not worry about anything for the night. Usually we're running around trying to see as much as possible in the amount of time we had, but Lucca was a very relaxing and just plain fun experience.

The next morning breakfast was brought to our room, which we all just thought was the greatest thing in the world, and then checked out and headed for Pisa.

There isn't a whole lot in Pisa besides the well known leaning Tower, Baptistry and Cathedral. That's actually all we did. We hopped off the train, ran accross the city to it, bought tickets to everything we had time to see, and spent our time in that area. I didn't climb the tower, because it was pretty expensive compared to climbing the Duomo in Florence, but I did enjoy the rest of it.

After that we got on a train back to Florence and made it back to Santa Chiara in time for dinner! Oh, with one more quick stop for the best gelato ever in Lucca.

All in all, it was a lot of fun. Lucca, a city of about 80,000 people, is probably on the top of my list for favorite places. It had the best vibe about it. I really enjoyed myself there. The rest of our group did too, which also helped make the experience a good one.

Next Wednesday we go to Orvieto! So, until then probably...