Our Italy Trip: Luca and Pisa

A nice Italian Fishing village with the boats sitting on the boatramp in the middle of town.

This is Luca, very beautiful historic town, close to Pisa. Does not have a leaning tower but is nicer and has a great old center with beautiful buildings.

Of course we have to include the tower of Pisa, interesting to learn the history. It already started sinking while contructing. During renovations they decided not to put it up straight, but keep it at an angle, it was already a tourist attraction.

There is also a beautiful church on the same square in Pisa.

One of the gorgeous sunsets we saw in Italy, more to follow:

Our Italy Trip: The Black Forest and the Alpes

First 'destination' of
our trip:  The Black Forest.
       A German area with rolling hills,
       forests and cute towns,
       like the picture on the right.













A waterfall in the Alpes, coming for the top of the mountain, falling all the way down.

Some pictures of the "Jungfrau" Aerea, beautiful mountains and valleys as far as you can see.
We visited a little village there, Gimmelwald, not very known, only reachable by foot or cable lift.

Testpost

Planning European summer trip

Today, May 16 we started planning our European trip for this summer

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 Leaving California

Myia wakes at 1:30 am in anticipation of the 3:30 wake up call and starts to get ready. Our dear friend, Eric takes up to the airport shuttle and waits with us til it comes at 4am. We get to SFO before 6am and begin the 2 day or 20 hour journey to Amsterdam. It has been a long and complicated exit and now we are on our way. We get to SFO before 6am and begin the 2 day or 20 hour journey to Amsterdam. It has been a long and complicated exit and now we are on our way and glad of it. The time has come to leave. An easy trip follows and we arrive excited and refreshed to sunny warm beautiful weather! No pictures taken today. This is the end of our travels thru the Western United Sates. Keep your eyes open for more adventures of our stay in Europe and Maui on this blog.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 We complete the sale of our van

The people who are buying the Van are wonderful and everything goes perfectly. And we have the money in our account so we can leave tomorrow with no worries. We take our hosts out to dinner at the favorite organic Chinese restaurant. They have been the best and growing friends. Truly what would we have done without the caring home base they provided? They are the best in our book! The picutres today show the abundance produce that California gardens produce.

Monday, October 12, 2009 Still packing and cleaning the van!

We start the day early with packing and getting EVERYTHING out of the van for delivery. There is so much more than we thought. Amazing how that is. And we thought we had plenty of room in the suitcases but, again surprisingly, it seems we do not. We have to leave all the extra, bulky and heavy things here. Sorry no presents! And there is a storm coming in! Our friend here, Caterina, warns of fog and possible problems with the airport departure. So we pray. That the people coming from Oregon to buy our van will be able to make it and that we can fly out! When I ask God he tells me that he has taken care of us very well so far and that everything will go well. So I guess I will buy that! We end the day, free of predicted rain, with a wonderful organic roasted chicken dinner prepared by our lovely and gracious host, Caterina. And celebrate the bounty of the Autumn California Harvest and our anniversary with the special bottle of homemade wine made by Myia’s niece, Kristin’s farm friend, Ken, from near Eureka. It had aged very well and was super delic!! And having a wonderful dinner with our friends and experimenting with our new camera and its self timer! But we did get all the family in one shot!