Divine Inspiration

Pisa, Italy

Gluttons for punishment, and as a final test for the anchor (will it hold if we are bold enough to take an overnight to Florence?)*, we decided to visit further afield and take a day trip by train to Pisa.

A quiet day in Pisa, except for the tourist hot spots

A leaning tower
for every occasion!

Looking across the River Arno, it is hard to imagine that Pisa was once an important Roman naval base (5^th c) and commercial port, building its power to eventually become an independent maritime republic (9^th c), a rival to both Genoa and Venice.  By the 13^th c, times were tough and Pisa chose the wrong side to back, losing both Corsica and Sardinia to Genoa.  Pisa later passed under Florentine rule and the wealthy Medici family took an interest in this aristocratic city.  Quite possibly because the city’s previous prosperity had seen the rise of a distinct architectural style, peculiar to Pisa alone and showcased in the delightful Romanesque Cathedral.  And the Medici’s were instrumental in the rise of the Renaissance, as we know!

We arrived at Pisa Centro (rail station) and decided on a walking tour of our own fashioning, helped along a bit by guidance from a chatty chap at the Tourist Information office.  We had, at least, a city map in one guide book, so we were doing rather better than our blind navigation through La Spezia.  Pisa had been noted as a city for walking, with the star attraction (the Leaning Tower) just 15 minutes away.  Other than tourists at the station, there seemed few others about, shops were mostly closed and traffic minimal.  This had the effect of making the city seem quite surreal.  So the tiny but extremely ornate Santa Maria della Spina (1230) built to house a thorn from Christ’s Crown of Thorns seemed oddly at home on its riverside frontage. 

Santa Maria della Spina

Inside the more modest Santa Caterina

Further on, we crossed the Arno at Ponte Mezzo and wandered into the bowels of Pisa’s shopping district, Borgo Stretto.  Somehow, we missed our turn and ended up at the church and monastery (now a school) of Santa Caterina.  Although it doesn’t feature in any of our books, it is certainly worth a peek inside.  It’s likely a little “old school” in comparison to the exotic Duomo but is non-the-less impressive.  Our path led us round the corner and quite close to the old city walls to crumbly Roman ruins, Nero’s Baths.  One has to wonder how they've even survived!  

So, this is where everyone is!! 
Leaning Tower with Duomo behind, & under repair.

Finally we could see our quarry, resplendent on the aptly named piazza, Field of Miracles (Campo dei Miracoli).  Seen together, the 4 buildings – the Duomo (Cathedral), the Baptistery, the Campanile (bell tower better known as the Leaning Tower) and the Camposanto (cemetery) – are simply, just that, miracles.  Built well before the engineering advances of Renaissance times, it is hardly any wonder these constructions provoked divine inspiration.  Galileo (1564-1642), a Pisan resident, climbed the tower to test his scientific theories.  We did not.  Galileo probably didn’t have the queue issues that exist today and I’ll bet he didn’t walk the Cinque Terre the day before either!  Indeed, we didn’t line up to go into any of these buildings, preferring to save ourselves for Florence.  So we sat in the shade of the Duomo, ate our lunch and admired the inspired creativity of mankind (given adequate financial backing that is).

Bapistery

Actually, it still has quite some lean

Continuing on down Via Santa Maria, we turned into the Piazza dei Cavalieri, the historic centre of Pisa surrounded by the Church of St Stephen, the Palace of the Knights of St Stephen and Palazzo Gherardesca.  The latter is built over the site where the bold Count Gherardesca (and his children) was condemned to die by starvation for his role in a naval defeat.  Well, it was the battle that saw the decline of the Pisan Empire and he was charged with treason but…

If I recall, this was the famous Knight,
Le Vallette (remember Malta)

Something to see at every turn

Commanding Municipal Buildings

Priceless timber carvings
in public view 

We wound our way back to the river, stopping to take note of a less famous leaning tower (yes, there are others) before a mercy dash to the station to take us home.  Our little legs would walk no further.

 

The Other Woman has never been left on her own overnight at anchor before.  It was a big moment indeed for the Cap'n - well, both of them really, to even consider taking a 3 day trip to Florence!  Of course, when we arrived back from our day trip to Pisa, WJ3 had dragged.  Now, she’d been well and truly dug in on arrival in La Grazie, in glutinous mud that gripped like concrete, not moving one iota since.  So the suspects were of course, our neighbouring day-trippin’ Italians, whose anchoring habits just have to be seen to be believed.  We guessed that one had dropped his anchor over our chain and managed to dislodge Bertha.  He must have wondered what on earth he’d caught when he pulled up his chain with 33kg extra attached!  So far this season, we’ve hauled up a bicycle wheel, a brick and enough rope & line to equip a fishing boat.  Well, undoubtedly a fly-on-the-wall moment missed and thankfully no damage done!  Bertha just got busy and dug herself right back in….