The highlight of the week was the visit of our Landrum neighbors, Gary and Betty Carver. They were on the last leg of a 3 city trip and were in Florence for 4 days. During this time we visited with each other, went to various museums, drank lots of expresso and some grappa, and on a very rainy day took a side trip to Pisa and Lucca. This week also saw celebrations of the 150th birth of unified Italy and there was much celebrating and tricolored bunting.

We have tickets to a concert of the Tokyo String Quartet for this afternoon (Saturday). We leave for London on Sunday.

Here we are in front of the leaning tower

A mural in the Pisa train station titled 'Hommage to Galileo'

This is the top of an arch at Piazza della Republica, in Florence. Translated, the inscription reads: 'The old city center, after centuries old squalor, restored to a new life'