Vivia Italia, part III
I just can't seem to stay away!

I had plans to go to Florence for New Year's, where J.O. was spending Christmas with his family. After my passport got stolen, I didn't think I would be able to go; however, it all worked out in the end. I was so happy to get to Florence, and I arrived Dec 31 bright and early after a 9 hour train ride. (Side note: night trains are totally the way to travel. They're cheap and you get a little couchette to sleep in, which is suprisingly comfortable. The conductors let you sleep through customs at any border crossings, and they wake you up in the morning with coffee and croissants. I am such a fan of the night trains.)

Here's a happy-sleepy Liz and a happy J.O., a little while after I arrived at the ungodly hour of 6:45am. Our my first day we walked around Florence, did some window-shopping and ate some gelato (yay!)










And then it was New Year's eve. Man oh man, the Italians love their fire-crackers, fireworks, and general merry-making. We had such a good time walking around the streets with thousands of other people, drinking wine, singing with drunk Italians (who suprisinly have a huge affinity for the White Stripes), and getting totally drenched with champagne at midnight. It was a great start to 2007!

On Tuesday, we decided that we wanted to visit the ocean, so we took the train to a small town in Tuscany called Viareggio. I love travelling in the winter - we were the only people on the beach! It was windy, but sunny and warm. In fact, while strolling around town I started fantasizing about buying a little house on the Italian Riviera and becoming a writer or something equally romantic. I could wear white linen, drink mojitos and start smoking cigars. I mean, how much fun would it be to live here:






The only drawback is that Italy tends to smell like sewer from time to time, at least in all the towns I've visited. And I've heard that it's much worse in places like Venice, where there's sewery water everywhere, and it seeps into the foundations of buildings. I guess the locals must just get used to it...they probably don't even smell it anymore. Meh - I'd still live there. What's a little sewer smell compared to a lifetime of ocean sounds, good food, great wine, and people saying "bambini" and "ciao ciao"?

After Viareggio, we went to Pisa to see the leaning tower. We made it just as the sun was setting and gave ourselves a whirlwind tour of the town. It's true - the tower really does lean, even more than it shows in this picture! As we expected, Pisa was totally touristy. I think I counted about a million of tiny marble replicas of the tower of Pisa for sale, and this isn't even tourist season.

On our last day, J.O., his parents and I all went to the Uffizi, Florence's most famous museum, to see Renaissance art. It was pretty spectacular, although I have confess that I can only look at so many paintings of the Madonna before my eyes glaze over. However, they also had a really great Leonardo da Vinci exhibit, focusing on his various inventions, his anatomy sketches and his work depicting one particular battle in Florence. I could have spent all day there, except for the hordes of elbowing people trying to make their way through the narrow exhibition space.

On another side note, during this trip, I learned one very important lesson. It's now been confirmed that I am totally addicted to Italian coffee. As much as I love strong Swiss espresso and the even stronger Turkish coffee they served in Tunisia, the cappuccino in Italy wins my heart, hands down. Italian coffee even beats Italian gelato, and sometimes I dream about the gelato here, because it's just that good. So you can see how important their cappuccino is to me. Sigh. I think I'm in love.

All in all, I had a really lovely New Year's. I'm so happy that I was able to travel and spend time with J.O. and his family in Italy. (So take that, guys who stole my passport - I win!) I hope you all had a fantastic start to 2007 and I wish you the best in the coming year!