After the magnificent Field of Dreams, the rest of the city is a bit of a letdown. It's pleasant, though a bit empty feeling downbeat. That is partly explained by its long history of decline, since the current population is only a fraction of its size 800 years ago. We stumbled across a lively food market lining the alleys close to the river, and pulled an ad hoc lunch together from the various stalls, complete with a nice bottle of local wine.



Like Florence, the Arno river cuts the city in half, leaving the other half almost empty of tourists. The rivalry between the two halves comes alive, however at the annual festival. The two teams line up on the connecting bridge, a giant cart between them, and they try to run the other side over with the cart. What fun!

The Campo Santo was the last addition to the Field of Dreams. The Archbishop of Pisa led the First Crusade to recapture Jerusalem, and on his return voyage, decided to collect the mother of all souvenirs by filling up all his boats with Holy Land dirt. He then dumped the dirt here, and presto, he could sell the holiest burial plots in Europe. Very elegant cloisters were subsequently built on the holy dirt, and the walls were covered with some of the Renaissance's best paintings. Unfortunately, the building was firebombed by the Americans during World War II, so most of the artwork was destroyed. The remaining painting is still being restored.

The baptistry is the largest in Italy, and like its tower companion, it tilts as well. Again locals will say it was a mistake, but most experts agree it was built by those crazy Pisanos on an intentional tilt. Both the tower and the baptistry were built in the 12th century, with the cathedral about one hundred years earlier and the Campo Santo one hundred years later. This building boom coincided with Pisa's peak in power and riches, before it got whacked on all sides by its neighbors and Mother Nature, as you'll read about later.

70. Pisa

Well, that pretty much finishes up the Florence sightseeing. We stayed in Florence for several more days, using it as a base to explore Tuscany. If you recall, we actually made a trip to Pisa the day before my birthday but I put off these entries so I could keep all the Florence entries together. So moving back in time (and I'm a year younger through the magic of time travel!) we took a train to visit the nearby city of Pisa. But I didn't need to tell you that, since the leaning tower pictured here is just about the most famous landmark in the world. The tower is part of an amazing complex in the Field of Dreams, which also includes the Cathedral, Baptistery, and the Campo Santo. Strangely, these amazing collection is parked in the far reaches of the city rather than in the center, unlike pretty much every other city in Europe. The complex is weird in many other ways as well, but nothing is stranger than this tower. It's pretty clear to everyone except the locals that the tower was built to tilt as some sort of madcap architectural statement. Locals insist it was originally built straight then started to lean, which is clearly not true. In any event, everyone agrees that it is now leaning more than was intended, so it was closed while we were there and surrounded by construction. (I'm pretty sure I read that it's reopened, which is probably a pretty disorienting experience since it's listing pretty heavily.)