We had a full day planned today, so got up and out of the hotel relatively early. Fortunately, that meant it wasn't quite so hot as we began our walk through the city. We grabbed breakfast at a small sidewalk cafe and then were off to the Uffizi Gallery. With our Firenze Pass we got to skip the line (can't recommend this enough!) and soon we were inside looking at a massive collection of ancient Roman sculptures and Renaissance art in a museum first started by...

A long travel day today. We had another wonderful breakfast in the garden, but then it was time to leave Cinque Terre and head to Florence. We took the train through Pisa to Firenze Santa Maria Novella railway station in Florence (Firenze = Florence in Italian). Fortunately, our hotel was just a short tram ride away, but it took us a little while to get situated and checked in. Since we didn't leave Cinque Terre until late morning and the trip took a few hou...

The best part about staying at a bed and breakfast is the breakfast.  Arin finally got to eat real cereal with milk, and we both had ham, cheese, and eggs.  Plus, we got to dine out in the garden - a beautiful little courtyard filled with flowers and lemon trees.  We needed to fill up, because we had a big day of hiking ahead of us. Cinque Terre is made up of five villages which are all connected by hiking paths.  The first leg of our trip was Monterosso to ...

Sleeping in seemed like a good idea at the time. We had our last breakfast at the Il Ciocco Resort before heading off to Pisa to return our rental car and catch the train to Monterosso. We arrived in Pisa a bit later than anticipated (see above), so we just had time to hop out of the car, take a picture of the Leaning Tower, and drive to the car rental return. (As an aside, there are a shocking number of places in Italy that only accept cash - including pay-at...

We are such good cooks! We spent most of the day at Chef Paolo Monti's cooking class in Lucca, about 45 minutes from our hotel. Of course, it took us an hour to get there since we drove down what appeared to be a narrow sidewalk, but was in fact the street Google Maps suggested. At the class, we learned how to make a variety of sauces and fresh pastas. We were joined by two sisters from Florida and a woman from Australia, but we were definitely the best pupils ...