Toscana

Hello!

Thanks for coming to my blog.

Today I have uploaded some photos of the camping bit of the holiday in Italy. We went to a camping site, Il Campo dei Fiori, near a small town called Vada in Tuscany. You can see a photo of the church and another of the square.

We had a lovely time with family and friends that came to see us over the 10 days at the camping site. Not to mention the wine, the food and great weather.

My parents came from Plymouth to join Daniela, myself and Daniela’s Mum. We hired two bungalows, one opposite the other. Tullio, Daniela’s brother, his wife Sandra and their daughter Francesca came to visit us, as did several of our friends. There is a photo of the family at the table.

There is also a photo of myself with my dear friend Manuela who came to visit us with her partner Gabriele. I have known Manuela from 1984 when Daniela and I moved to live in Bologna. She is a primary school teacher and uses my blog to create English lessons for her class.

I would like to say a special hello! ciao ragazzi! to the children she teaches and a big thank you to them for following my blog. It makes me very happy to know that my blog is being put to educational use.

The other photos are of the beaches, the sunflowers, the countryside of Tuscany which I love so much.

Next weekend we'll be in Hong Kong. I am going for work so we'll have the weekend to explore. I've been several times but not had much time to see more than the Peak.

In two weeks, I'll post a tour of Torino! Do come back.

Love

Alan
















Swimming pool at the camping site
















Left: Tullio, Barbara and Roy (my parents)
Right: Sandra, Germana (Daniela's Mum), Daniela and me




















Manuela and me

















Beach at Vada

















Golfo di Baratti
















Golfo di Baratti
















Harvest time in Tuscany






















A long view
















Tuscan farmhouse, (unfortunately not ours!)


















Daniela and Sunflowers
















Pine forest, Baratti


















Us in Baratti!

Collodi - Italy

Ciao and benvenuti! (Hi and welcome!)

We arrived back in Singapore after a wonderful holiday in Italy.

I am going to upload 3 postings covering the trip over the next few weeks. The first is on Collodi, in North Tuscany, where Daniela’s Mum lives and where we stayed for some of the time. The second is the camping holiday at Vada in central Tuscany. Finally I have some photos of the few days we were in Turin in Piemonte.

Collodi is the home of Pinocchio. The author was Carlo Collodi. He was born Carlo Lorenzini in Florence, but took his pen name Collodi from his mother who was a Collodian.

The original Collodi is a small narrow medieval hamlet (12th Century) that winds and twists its way up a Tuscan hill, near Lucca and Florence. In the more modern town at the foot of Collodi there is also a famous Pinocchio theme park. At the front of the town there is a 'villa' (more like a palace!) called 'Villa Garzoni'. Garzoni was the noble family of the area. The Garzoni Park is well known by butterfly lovers.

I very much enjoyed being in the ancient village again. Singapore is so modern, I realised I was thirsting for some history! In Italy there's ooooodles of it. But it's a steep climb. Reminded me a bit of the Great Wall of China!

I hope you enjoy the photos. See you in a couple of weeks!

Love

Alan