Our room is beautiful, looks right over the canal which is a working canal. Shirley and I wake about 7.00 a.m.,down for breaky , met the group, all decide to explore their own way . That done Shirley and I are off to the famous ponte di Rialto ( Rialto bridge). We meander through the lane ways of Venice stopping at a number of shops and stalls, just enjoying the surrounding, it so hard for us to accept that we are actually here. You will be please to know with t...

I start this blog with our last day in Certaldo Tuscany and finish it with our arrival in Venice. Friday started slowly ,rainiing, still tired from the wine tour,so just lazed around to lunch. Soon after Shirley and I were off to San Gimignano, a small village surrounded by a wall but inside there are many different types of shops and craft as well as historic buildings. Shirley, Di and I all went on a spending spree,I known its hard to believe, but yes I spen...

To Steven, Kim and Mitch read it an weep. This is the wine tour not to miss when in Tuscany. Day 6,  Shirley, Balty, Karen And I are off on a wine tour of the famous wine  Brunello region Montalcino. We are picked up by Silvio who just happen to be part of cooking class we went to on Tuesday .  The first winery we visit is called La Fornace, set high the hills, the view alone is spectular. There 12 acres under vines, they yield approximately 60 thousand lite...

The morning was not what stress head drivers wanted to see, pea soup fog, great, I hope the navigator ( the garman) can work better in fog than I. We leave the villa by 9 under the guidance of the Garman and hope that as we go we are off toward the well known tourist attraction Pisa, and it's learning Tower. The garman perform pretty well and we arrive at Pisa at 11.00, find our parking, we are less than a kilometer to the Tower,take us less than 20 minutes to w...

9/10/12 Organic cooking class  at Tavarnellie We left here at 9 to be there by 10.30 a.m, peeing  down rain,great day to do this class. Arrived,on time to be meet by Silvio, Saraenella and  of course the main chef Manuela. Introduction over we begin,our first thing to do was for each to prepare their pasta, we given enough flour, eggs and olive oil to mix together which in turn creates the pasta base, it is just like making mud pies, this now has to sit for...