May 9, 2009

Hillary and I woke up early so we could ride our bikes to the train station.  My butt bones hurt because I haven’t ridden a bike for a while and yesterday was the first day.  Luckily there wasn’t any traffic getting to the station so we made very good time and we were able to catch a train shortly after we got there.  We had to switch trains 3 times and it took us about 2 ½ hours to get to Lucca. 

When we got to Lucca, we walked straight out of the station and up onto the walls of the city.  The walls go all around the city and they were made thick enough that there is a pedestrian walk where people go on walks and ride bikes.  There are also some small parks where you can sit and read or play with your dog.  We say los of people just hanging out on the grass.  Everything is green in Lucca.  There were lots of trees along the walls and lots of grass. 

As soon as we started walking I started getting really bad allergies so Hillary and I headed into the centre of the city and stopped at a pharmacy.  I got some allergy medicine that made me feel a lot better. 

Then we went to the piazza di San Michele where we got lunch.  We had some focaccia bread and some pizza.  They were both really good; the place where we got them is quite famous.  The man that helped us at the bakery was so nice.  I didn’t know exactly how to do it and there were a lot of customers shouting orders.  This man saw that we looked lost so he was extra nice to us.  And then his coworker was like, “Oh, ma questa è Italiana!”  I was like, “No, actually I’m Mexican.”  And the man was like, “No, no, no, sei Italiana! Parli molto bene, complimenti!”  (No, you’re Italian!  You speak very well, compliments!)  I guess tourists don’t often speak much Italian. 

After we ate Hillary and I walked around a lot.  We looked at shops and different little churches.  Everything was pretty cool, but I sort of felt like I had already seen all of it.  To Hillary everything was still new and she wanted to go into every single little church and I feel like I’ve already seen dozens of them since this is my 3^rd time to Italy.    

After we walked around a lot we decided to take a break on the city walls.  We laid down for a while and just rested.  After that we decided to get back on the train and stop in Pisa so we could see the leaning tower before we went home.  It took us forever to walk back to the station because we got lost so many times.  Once we got in Pisa we could see the tower from afar so we walked in that general direction but it ended up not being as close as it looked and so it felt like we walked forever.  By this time my feet were hurting so bad!  When we finally got there we were both like, “Wow!”  It’s pretty cool.  The tower is right next to this big cathedral and they are both surrounded by a lot of grass.  It looks like the area has been cleaned up and set up really nicely for tourists.  We took the typical pictures with the tower that everyone takes and walked around some more.  Then we headed back to the station (which took us like half an hour on foot!).  When we got to the station we couldn’t find our train up on the board.  Hillary really needed to go to the bathroom really badly so I told her to go find one at the Mc Donalds that was in the train station.  Then I looked at all of the departures until I found our train and I saw that it departed in 4 minutes!  I shifted into “mission impossible” mode and quickly made my way over to the girl’s bathroom.  It was really loud and I couldn’t see what stall she was in so I just started yelling, “Hillary, Hillary!! Our train leaves in four minutes!!”  She told me later that she tried to respond that she was hurrying but it was so loud in there that I couldn’t hear her so I just kept shouting until she came out.  It was pretty funny!!  We ran to our platform and made it to our bus just in time.  We made our train changes but our last train was running late so it took us like 3 hours to get home.  We stopped by the grocery store to get some things for tomorrow.  Hillary and I are going to have a picnic after church in this really pretty park by our house.  On our bike ride him I was huffing and puffing so much because I am SO out of shape and there are a couple of killer inclines. 

We had dinner and now we are ready for bed.  It’s been a long day and I don’t ever remember walking so much but it was a good day.  It felt very good to get out and see a new place.