With rain and heavy winds forecast we couldn't decide whether to go hide in the museums of Florence or head to the beach and keep our fingers crossed. After some compass work and amateur weather forecasting we decided to go with the beach and some Italian Carnavale at Viareggio....

We managed to tick off the pancakes at a cafe on arrival and then headed to a huge, sandy beach that was unsurprisingly deserted except for the crazy English family as the sky got greyer and the wind started to affect play in the ball game!

We eventually decided to head back inside to warm up before the carnavale with some pizza to be told that the carnavale was cancelled due to the high winds but that we could head up to where the floats were stored to see them ..... this turned out to be almost as good as the carnavale for us and much cheaper! The floats were amazing, absolutely works of art and we were astounded at how good they were but as the party was in full swing and the music was very loud we left fairly swiftly with our photos, to get the train back to Pisa and Bob.

In Pisa Mardi Gras still seems in full swing though. Sirens are going all around us as well as alarms going off everywhere as the wind picks up here - it could be a wobbly night!