Pisa; Friday, 30 September, 2016

As it was an early flight I’d stayed overnight at an airport hotel, and shortly after dawn found myself waiting for the hoppa bus back to the terminal.

A smooth journey through the airport and a bumpy flight later I was in Pisa and after catching the bus into town walked the short distance to the hotel where I dropped off my stuff and headed out into town.

I walked up through the city centre, across the Arno river and on into the older part of the city, heading for the main attraction of the town the Cathedral and its infamous bell tower. However, before I reached them I realised that I was actually quite hungry so I stopped in one of the restaurants near the tower for a very late lunch/early dinner.

Sated I headed on to the cathedral square to start having a look around the key sights of Pisa.

I’d pre-purchased a ticket, which included an early evening ascent of the tower so I started off by visiting one of the museums before starting on the main buildings, taking advantage of the early evening departure of all the day trippers from Florence to have a lot of the sites quietly to myself.

I looked around the impressive Camposanto and the Baptistery before heading over to the Cathedral to lo around that.

By the time I left the cathedral it was time to head over to the luggage office to hand my bag in and then head over to the tower to start my ascent

I’d timed my ticket to make sure I’d be at the top of the tower at sunset and I wasn’t disappointed. As most of the day trippers had gone there were only about 20 people at the top of the tower to watch the sun turn the sky orange and then deep red as it descended behind the old city walls.

Having watched the sun go down I headed back down the tower and spent a bit of time wandering around the site in the dusk, being able to take phots without hordes of tourists getting in the way. I then wandered back through town, stopping for a late evening drink in the old town before walking back over to the hotel.