Hello, all...time for an update!

Here's a shocker: for once, we actually have free, fast internet (and cable tv)...in...our...room. In our room! No, ladies and gentlemen, this is not some fancy-schmancy resort hotel up in the wine-drenched tuscan hills -- this is a hostel. Luna Rossa Rooms, to be exact, but a hostel all the same. Should you ever wish to come to Florence on a relatively tight budget, book this place on hostelworld.com. Young, entrepreneurial Marco will fix you up.

Speaking of Marco...it seems that one fourth of Italy's population is christened Marco. Our other Marco, the nephew of the proprietess of our hostel in (s)easy-breezy little Vernazza (our temporary "hometown" in the Cinque Terre), gave us a surprise when we told him that we were ready to pay and, rather than taking our money, he cheerily handed us a corkscrew. No, this was not an anachronistic outpouring of old-world, family-style hospitality...this was babel, a complete and utter failure to communicate, on both our part and theirs. We got it all sorted out in the end...but only after a frenzied game of charades and big smiles. That was Monday, I believe...

Really, it's like they didn't expect us to pay. Of course, it wasn't really like that, but such is the fairytale magic of the Cinque Terre...the panoramas are so spectacular, the aqua-blue water so clear, the food so good (and relatively cheap, to boot), it all seems utterly unreal (Katie, for one, must've called the place unreal north of a hundred times...yes, she took lots of photos). We had a fairly typical visit: on the first day (Monday), we hiked in between the first four towns and ate dinner in the third; later that night, we hung around Vernazza, seeing as the town was celebrating some sort of religious hoiday...the chitlins were sack-racin', the grown-ups were preparing a fireworks show, the toothless old ladies were wending their way through the town's one street in the wake of a friar bearing a big, crucified Christ statue...in a nutshell, it was quite a sight. On the second day (that being Tueseday), we hauled our big, lumpy backpacks to the beach turtle-stylee for a good half-day of sand and pebbles and sun. Unfortunately, that was all the time we had for the Cinque Terre; and so, our bodies all caked with sea salt, we barely caught our first train, sorta missed our second, and, by some divine will other than our own, we managed to catch one, final train heading to Pisa Centrale to La Spezia (not our train, mind you...just a train).

At this point, we were feeling invincible...heck, we were feeling spontaneous! So we decided to abort our plan to head straight to Florence and instead hopped off at Pisa to take dozens of cheesy leaning tower pictures in the company of dozens and dozens of equally obnoxious tourists, who, like us, were hell-bent on perfecting their own cheesy, leaning tower pictures.* At Pisa, you musn't photograph just the tower...you must photograph everybody photographing the tower as well (it took me awhile to convince Katie of this simple truth, but, with time, she came around). Fittingly, we finished our photo shoot with cheap pizza and coca-cola.

Later that evening, we arrived in Florence, birthplace of the Renaissance, aka birthplace of the rebirth place (Katie insists that this is not funny...she's probably right). On Wednesday morning, I got an early start and made my way to the U.S. Consulate, where a small African-Italian child attempted to break my left ankle. Luckily for me, he failed. After about an hour of inane paperwork, I got my emergency passport, which, sadly, looks quite fake (I'd just rather not get beat up at the airport...you understand).

Afterwards, Katie and I rendezvoused at the famous San Lorenzo market, where we slammed down a couple of cappucinos before putting our poor, aching feet through hell at the Uffizi Galleries and Ponte Vecchio, oldest bridge in Europe. Later that afternoon, rather than giving it a rest, we opted to climb all 436 steps to the top of Il Duomo (oof), atop which we were rewarded with a great view.

Today, we spent the morning taking a walking tour of the city, where, as usual, we felt very uncool mingling among impeccably dressed Europeans. Our nice yet rather distracted tour guide was careful to inform us that even the Florentine caribinieri (local police) all wear uniforms specially designed by Valentino. Go figure.

This afternoon, we took a train to the antique Tuscan town of Lucca and rode bikes atop the city's ancient walls. After returning to Florence, we ate (more) Italian food (it never really gets old, y'know) and drank big, towering fruity cocktails at a place called Art Bar (special thanks to Paige and Julia for the reccommendation).

Tomorrow, we've got another full day in Florence; and on Saturday, we head to Rome!

Whew. Okay. I think that's all for now. So until next time...

Ariba derci!

Kampermans

*Note: there are trains constantly running b/w Pisa and Florence...I don't wanna leave y'all w/ the impression that we were actually all cool and spontaneous, 'cause we weren't, and we're not. Ciao!