From the Riviera we tentatively made our way towards Pisa, half expecting the car to die at any minute. It survived so there was much celebration when we arrived, especially when we found a campsite with a swimming pool. Naturally we went to check out the Leaning Tower, along with every other tourist in the area.
Our next destination was Firenze (Florence) for a couple of days sight seeing. The city is certainly beautiful, and two days wasn't enough to do it justice. The campsite we chose was above the city, very close to the replica statue of David with amazing views of the city. We took a bus tour and spent some time roaming the streets, but missed out on the museums and galleries because the lines were so huge. August was the wrong time of year to visit, the unrelenting heat and the crowds were no fun at all (neither were the mosquito bites I got the first night when I fell asleep with the tent unzipped!).
Leaving, however, was not a relief as it was horrible being back in the car. The weather was scorching, there was no air conditioning, and there was no room to move. However, this made it all the better when we came across a huge lake not far from Firenze and decided to go swimming. Floating in an Italian lake in the middle of summer is a definite mood booster!
My euphoria lasted until I fell asleep on the motorway when I was supposed to be navigating. This resulted in exiting the motorway much too early, being demoted from by position as navigator, one of the boys taking over as navigator and sending us the wrong way back down the motorway, them being demoted as navigator, and then the other one doing exactly the same thing, resulting in a detour of 60 miles. At least the sunset was nice!
We arrived very late into Parma where we were once again looking for accommodation in the dark, with limited success. Owen and I slept in the car, which was an interesting experience. We were unfamiliar with the areas of the city, and suspect that we stumbled into the redlight district to start with. Once our mistake became shockingly obvious we tried a couple more spots before finally finding an empty carpark on the very outskirts of town. The next day involved a lot more driving as we had to get back to Nice for Campbell's flight. We all had our fingers crossed that we would have more luck finding a campsite this time!
If you would like to see more photos (including more by Owen and Troy), check out my flickr page.