Tony and Liz's Travel Adventures # 2: ITALY: Arriving in BOLOGNA and our train trip to see the “LEANING TOWER OF PISA”.

Arriving into Bologna it was just on dark. And unfortunately we don’t fancy arriving at night time because we seem to get a little disorientated. When it’s light at least we get the opportunity to observe different landmarks and give us a sense of our bearings. Right there and then it was only a little bit of a problem. As fate would have it across the road from the station were a variety of restaurants, gelatarias and cafes (making a mental note - ones that we HAD to visit over the next few days ).

Nightfall in Bologna

So outside in the glow of the station lights we stood there distracted by the eateries, cafes and restaurants, shaking ourselves off from the excitement of having a real Spaghetti Bolognaise. We finally made our way to 4 Viale Angelo Masini, less than 500 metres from the train station. Settled in and headed straight back down the road across from the station with only the thoughts of ….Spag Bog for dinner, Gelati for dessert. Ahhh! authentic Italian!

The choice was difficult because there quite a few to choose from, even a Chinese café a little further down. We’ll make that one tomorrow night.

Having heard and read about all the good things about Bologna we knew we would need a few days to look around and see the sites because the architecture here is unbelievable and a must-see. In any event we needed to set aside a full day for a trip to see the ”Leaning Tower of Pisa” too.

The famous "Leaning Tower of Pisa"

It was “do-able” – and early TOMORROW in fact. The trip would take around 2 and a half hours all up allowing for a train change in Firenze Rifredi, to Empoli then on to Pisa. Maybe a little longer on the way back to Bologna because we’d be travelling on a different route stopping in Prato. All good.

Well you wouldn’t believe it ! At our first stop we looked up to see 2 women who were standing in the carriage doorway, looking left to right, and we heard one of them mention something about “Turistas”. Then only one of them hopped off. We thought they were checking out the seating arrangements. NO!! The one who stayed on the train (it was obvious she was Gypsy), starting walking down the aisles as the train pulled out of the station leaving little cut-out Notes on the arm rests of each occupied seat. Our instinct was to leave it there. Tony was curious. The Note read –“ I am a single mother with 3 children, I do not have a home, I have no money. I care for my 2 younger brothers and we have no food. Pray for Us”. It was now obvious that they were sussing out who was on the train ie. “Turistas” and if there were any Rail Police on board between stations.

Well, Luvvy! If you are in such a difficult circumstance – how on earth do you manage to print out enough notes on your electricity powered computer, enough to fill 6 train carriages. Don’t even get me started about the kids being left alone somewhere…because they haven’t got a home !!!

Before we reached the next station she’d returned rattling her plastic cup into the faces of the passengers saying something about her plight and with the best Hollywood tears you would ever see. Almost everyone, including us, avoided eye contact or just waved her away as she collected her little notes. When the Rail Police were spotted boarding at the next station, in true Hollywood fashion the tears disappeared and she high tailed it off the train. “Pray for Us” – Pray we will - that we don’t have to encounter this again!

Early Morning in Pisa

Being Sunday morning, it was quiet in the streets of Pisa (people still in mass?) and we were enjoying our relaxing stroll keeping an eye out for directional maps of how to get to the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

The Tower

That was until……..!!

You see, there was this seedy long haired (mullet cut) guy slowly riding his bicycle up fairly close and keeping pace with us. (The Mullet Cut should have been enough to make us suspicious!) As we moved to the side of the street so did he on his bike. He followed us for a fair way then tried to strike up a conversation. We knew it wasn’t just normal conversation – it was an asking type of tone like – “Do you have cigarettes or money?” Thank goodness we couldn’t understand any Italian. We just waved him away, as you do – it works with the Gypsies. And seriously we couldn’t understand anything he was saying. And he just kept on at us – riding along on his bicycle babbling away. And besides we thought he probably couldn’t understand us either. Then he started raising his voice – then I heard him say THAT WORD, the one I learnt from the subtitles of the late night SBS TV Italian movies. You know that one …. the “F – word”.

(WARNING: The following comments you are about to read contain Adult Themes, Sexual References and only suitable for Mature Audiences). This mullet haired, stalker bicycle rider told us – in his best Italian to - “F ** K-Off”.

On hearing that, me now getting angry, my reaction was to tell him to “F ** K-Off” in English. And I did. I wasn’t going to have anyone talk to me like that, either was Tony (but he was oblivious to what this guy said anyway). Imagine the look on Tony’s face when I blurted it out. He momentarily stood there motionless. The funny part about this is… You know what “Mr Mullet” said back? In good old plain ENGLISH, (English, can you believe?) he replied, “Well You F ** K Off too!!” And rode his bike away. LOL, LOL.

Tony and I laughed so hard I think we must have shamed this bloke so much after our little exchange of “F” words he didn’t even turn back to look at us.

Still laughing we made it to the “Leaning Tower of Pisa” only to find that the streets back in the city were quiet because everyone seemed to be at the tower site.

Entrance into the Tower Site

Seriously, there were hundreds of people there snapping photos, taking videos, trying to make out like they were pushing the tower back into place. Did we do that? Sure! Do you know how stupid it really looks doing that? Sure, just look at the photo! There were so many people everywhere that there is no way in the world you can have a photo taken on your own. Does anyone know what the phrase is for “Multiple” Photo-Bombs.

Let's try stop it from falling over !!!

Market Stalls inside the site

Our time at the Tower of Pisa was spent walking around and reading the various plaques explaining how this phenomenon has come to be, the stabilisation and engineering of the site over the years and us taking lots and lots of photos.

Market Stalls Outside the Walls to the site

We ventured over to the market stalls, the outside of the ancient walls only to find more markets that we just as crowded...and they all sold everything imaginable with the Leaning Tower of Pisa on it – Tea Towels, Key rings, T-shirts, Little Leaning Towers of Pisa, Table cloths, more Tea Towels and T-shirts. All this leaning stuff was making us dizzy.

We had seen enough! Dare we venture back into the streets way of bicycle riders? Yep but we didn’t get hassled this time. Instead we just took our time enjoying the views over the River Arno and some of the magnificent doorways and amazing, and sometime creepy looking, door knockers.