Trafton’s European Tour 2022/2023

Greetings from beautiful Moneglia Italy! Yesterday, tour guide Cindy and I decided to visit Pisa and the famous Square of Miracles in Pisa

When I was a kid, a long time ago, when we thought of Italy, the only thing I thought of was Rome and The Tower of Pisa because that’s the only picture’s I ever saw.

Pisa is part of Tuscany, so it’s two hours away. We decided to take the train, because driving into Italian city’s you don’t know can be nerve racking.

Easy two hour train ride, then hop on a city bus for a quick trip to the square.

Pisa has a very, very ancient history, some say back to 600 BC. It has the usual Italian history, wars with City’s, Vikings, Mongol hoards, Crusaders, ect…

However, Pisa was and remains a very wealthy city because it is a city that has rivers that run into the ocean.

The Square of Miracles has several different areas.

The cathedral was started in 1100 AD and took several hundred years to build. It’s been burned and rebuilt several times. Those pesky Mongols!

As I said, Pisa in 1100 AD was very, very rich

We didn’t go to in the Baptistery, but that’s what it was for,Baptisms

The last piece of the Square of Miracles is the most famous, The Tower of Pisa. Started in the late 1100’s, engineering changes to stabilize in the 1990’s. It was built on wet soil so it immediately started to lean and as the city was busy warring it sank even more.

Surrounding the big three are the Camposanto, which refers to a graveyard built around the big three. The soil for the Camposanto was brought in by ships from the holy land. Bodies we said to decompose in 24 hours in that soil.

We are going to take a day off and get caught up on stuff and rest a little on the beach!

We are driving to Toulouse, France tomorrow. It’s a long drive, nine hours. Two nights there, then Logrono, Spain for three nights, then Salamanca, Spain for two nights.

So, we move a lot in the next week, ending in Cadiz, Spain for 11 nights. So I might not get to blog much, but we’ll catch up sooner, rather than later.

Ciao, Ciao, Ciao from Italy!