First order of business, with Rosi in tow, was to go to the Tau Touring office and set up a tour for us for Tuesday, to Carrara. First we stopped at the Forno Casale and reserved some pizza and foccacia for later. They close at 1:15.  We then walked the very few blocks to the Torre Guinigi to climb the tower, which is right in the center of Lucca.  The views were gorgeous on this clear-ish morning. First I was taken with this green wall.  The color doesn’t translate perfectly, but the texture looks good.

The climb up was not very difficult for us and on the top there are some trees which makes it seem like a tiny park.  I wished they’d had something to help us know what we were seeing in the distance but we just stared out and took it in.  “Not too shabby!”

on the way up.

On the top!

From the tower we walked around downtown.  Caught a street opera singer:

Singer showing Rosi his photo album

All morning we had a hard time getting through to Anthony–something was wrong with his phone.  Finally we heard from him that Lyn was sleeping and we should go on and eat lunch.  So we brought the pizza etc. back to our place and had a bit of salad with it and a red wine from Scansano which we really liked.

Rest time was next and then Ken and I had to go to the Vodafone store for some phone business. All good.  Rosi met us over there and we walked a bit, stopped at a local photography show and got a coffee sitting at some outside tables on via San Nicolao.  This is the life!

Why are these cushion on the street?

We took the rest of the food up to A&L’s apartment just before our 7:00 Puccini/Mozart concert at the San Giovanni church.  Puccini was born and rose to great fame as the favorite son of Lucca.  It was a very short walk from their place.  There were around 150 people there which surprised me for a Monday night–mostly tourists.  I guess there is no seasonal end here until winter. We all enjoyed the 1 hour concert, even me who knows only Nessun Dorma and the Maria Callas song from Philadelphia.  They seemed extremely talented to me, but I’ no expert, at all.

stage is set

Back up to A&L’s place for a bit of Prosecco, the rest of the lunch foods and great conversation.  A lot is going on in my head about selling my mom’s house and I was able to hash some of it out with my friends.

Walking home on the quiet Lucca streets was…an exhale.