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Dan and I had a fairly simple excursion for this day. A Princess bus would take us into Pisa (about a 40 minute drive). Once in Pisa, we would be given a short tour and then left to wander around with a designated meeting time and place so we could be taken back to the ship . To see the Field of Miracles was awe-inspiring. The day before we visited Pisa, the ship had a show on the in-cabin TVs which told the story of how the Leaning Tower of Pisa got its lean. The most interesting part of the program was the fact that scientists and architects aren't able to figure out how the tower is still standing! The tower's lean has been so extreme in the past that it should have fallen many years ago. Currently, the lean has been corrected so the tower is no longer in danger of falling down, however it is still an amazing site to see.
A fun little factoid is that the tower does not lean in a straight line. Because the tower took so long to build, it began to lean before it was completed. To fix this slight lean (at least visually), the second builder lengthened the pillars and stones on one side of the tower to raise the dipping side. This "adjustment" means that the tower actually has a shape similar to a banana. Wild, isn't it?
After our organized tour, Dan and I wandered around the square, snapping pictures and picking up souvenirs. Dan also managed to load himself down with bottles of beer, a running theme during our cruise. Then it was goodbye to Pisa and back to the ship. On to Monte Carlo, Monaco Back to The Mediterranean Last updated: 13-Jul-04 |
