The way we have been trying to do our travels is a day in the city enjoying the culture and the tourist stuff, and then a day out in the countryside hiking or walking as all 4 of us love being active and in nature. So we talked to the front desk and they pointed us towards a town called Fiesole, a small old town outside of Florence. They gave us directions to get to the bus station and told us it would be about a half hour by bus! Perfect! Well, as it seems to be the case when we venture out of the big cities (where you would expect the problems to happen!) we ran into a little trouble. When we showed up at the bus stop a local informed us that the busses were on strike for the day (after seeing us wait for like 20mins!). So we had a team meeting and decided we would just walk to the town, since we had our hearts set on leaving the city. So off we went on our walk and it was hot and uphill, but nice had many nice views all the same. After we arrived in Fiesole (2hrs later) we went to the info center where they gave us a map of the city and we gave ourselves a self guided tour, we did 2 of the 3 loops before lunch and saw some beautiful Tuscan country side. We then had the classic spaghetti and tomato sauce (so much better in Italy) for lunch before venturing onto the 3rd loop. The third loop was the best by far. It was right in the country side and was a very rugged hike! We had some steep hills to climb and didn't really know where we were going as it was poorly marked but it had great views, and it was nice to get the heart pumping after a few days of leisurely walking. We even saw the place where Leonardo Da Vinci had his first flight, after seeing the ledge he jumped from I'm sure he must have been a little bit crazy. We caw a cave, olive trees, and of course managed to get a bit lost, ending our hike 3hrs later. We then had some gelato before beginning our downhill trek home. When we got home we realized that we had walked for pretty much 9hours straight that day (not including our 30min lunch break) and decided to have a nap before dinner. We then had dinner, gelato, and headed to bed for an early night. However we didn't fall asleep right away as our paper thin walls let us listen to a full on Italian Opera going on in the church right beside us. This would have been really cool if it weren't for the fact that we had a train to catch at 4:30 am the following morning and it didn't end until 11, giving us around 4 hours of sleep after a full day of hiking!

Fun Fact: Not from Italy but however…Barcelona imported all their beach sand from Egypt, and have to import more every few years as the tide washes it away, as they are all man made beaches there.