To the east of where we are staying spreads the famous Chianti region. When we examine the map roads seem to travel from north to south with not many traversing across implying significant flow of mountains or hills. All the roads show extreme tortuosity and we decide that this is…

We are not that far away from Siena and we plan to visit today, it is a nice straight road to get there:) and no hills until we arrive.  Just as we start coming into town I look up information on parking and there is a recommendation for the Santa…

André does an early morning start to check out the photo opportunities around our little town and comes back with a gorgeous panorama. We settle into our usual breaky and plan the route for the day. This is as we leave our little home. We plan to take back roads…

Today is a little travel day, we pick up a car, which this time André will be driving and we move out of Florence to a tiny village called Certaldo in Northern Tuscany. Luca from our cooking class when we mentioned we were coming here, told us it was his…

Tanya and I have been looking forward to this “experience” as Luca and Lorenzo call it since we enquired about it last year. We meet Luca and the rest of the group, another 6 people at the train station for the short ride to their property just outside Florence in…

Tanya has made sure that we do not miss out on seeing Michelangelo’s David by getting tickets with the same company we visited the Vatican with as this was such a good experience. We awake to solid rain and wonder if they will still run the tour. In our excitement…

Today is our travel day from Cinque Terre. I know you are all waiting to hear if the taxi arrived for us…… yes, including a phone call just before to ask if we were already outside waiting, also handled in Italian. Ok I will stop bragging, but I finally got…

This morning we reunite the Bear family and head to Monterosso to complete our exploring of the Cinque Terre. André plans to stay for a sunset shot of Manarola, so his will have an extra long day. It seems a little less busy today and we noticed there were no…

It has been a tough night for Tanya as her coughing has intensified over night, so she decides to give today a break and lounge around soaking up the Portovenere view. Andre and I abandon her ( with her blessing, as we are going to try another traverse today) and…

This is our travel day and we will meet up with André who has just flown into Rome. The day starts with a beautiful sunrise from our apartment window. We will get breakfast at the station as our train leaves quite early for La Spezia. After a smooth transition to…