Rome has been great, you are immersed in history whichever way you turn. We were sad to move on from Chianciano Terme on Friday, it had such a wonderful feel about this town, very relaxed. On the way to Rome we stopped at Tarquinia where we had a tour of the Etruscan tombs there as well as the Archaeological Museum. Both places were great, lots of relics & information by our excellent guide. We really got a sense of life in those times, especially of how keen...

On our way to Chianciano Terme we stopped at Ravenna to visit the church of St Apollinaris in Classe which houses some of the finest mosaics in Italy. It was built in the 4th century & is very unique in that even though a Christian Church there are definite influences of early pagan churches. We have just had 2 lovely nights in Chianciano Terme, a lovely hillside town famous for it's therapeutic springs. We were staying in a quiet hotel just on the edge of to...

On Monday we left Florence & headed to Venice. On the way we had a good stop at Bologne, not a place I knew much about. A lovely guide called Natalie showed us around town. Was quite an interesting place with a significant history of resistance fighting during WW2. This proved to quite influencing of the outcome of the war for Italy. Bologne also had an amazing array of designer shops. They seem to be everywhere over here! from there onto Venice. Lovely for m...

Had a great look around Florence the past 2 days, yesterday we did a walking tour with Patrizia, our guide for the day. We checked out such things as the Duomo & Baptistry & Santa Croce (where Michaelangelo & Galileo are buried). We also checked out the leather making Peruzzi store. The shop was amazing with Gold & Leather goods abounding. In the afternoon after some down time Charlie & I did some more exploring around the central part of town...

Today we headed to Siena, a great Tuscan hill city steeped in history back beyond the Romans. This city was one of the main locations on the Old Roman Cassia Trade Road along with Orvieto, Perugia & Cortona. Siena is very unique in that it has a huge main Piazza that slopes downwards in the middle in a wavy way from it's four sides. More amazing examples of Florentine architecture from times past especially its Duomo. Siena like Lucca was well known for it's ...