...and then we...

Saturday Darcy and I took a day trip from Firenze (Florence) to Siena, a picturesque town with a center square made famous by the horse race they have twice a year.

The 17 different neighborhoods vie to win the race called "Palio". Apparently there's a lot of community pride that goes into that race. On our way back to the station, we came across Anziano (Elder) White and Anziano Welsh. They were on there way to the branch "Dessert Night". They invited us to join them, and we were tempted... but decided to stick with our original plan. Said plan was to attend another concert in another cathedral. This time, the concert was in a full-size cathedral (Stake Center length and 5-6 stories high inside. The performance was by a Dutch Youth Symphony. They started out with Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet. It was a great experience. Afterwards Darcy had some comments about a bassoon being out of tune, but overall she enjoyed it too. At the same time, we missed a Flamenco concert in another part of town and a third classical music performance in one of the museums. Hearing Romeo and Juliet in the cathedral will bring a whole new feeling when I hear it again at home.
Sunday morning we checked out from the convent and found our way to Church by means of a Taxi with a GPS navigator. It so happened that the study-abroud group from BYU Marriot School of Business group was there too. One of the girls recognized Darcy from when they worked together at the MTC cafeteria. So far, Darcy has met somebody she knows from BYU every Sunday I've been here.
At Church I enjoyed speaking in Spanish with the people who are here from Peru. There are a lot. There must be some connection for Peruvians to easily come and work in Italy.
After Church, we took the train to Pisa. We've got pictures of the leaning tower that will be posted later, since time on the computer here is very expensive. We had an interesting experience getting back on the train in Pisa. We had checked our bags into the luggage storage area. When we got back from the tower, we found our track and were relaxing on a bench feeling lucky that we had timed it just right, since the train was only a few minutes away. After sitting there awhile we realized we had left our luggage in storage. Luckily the train was about 5 minutes late. Had we gotten there just before the train left, we would have left our luggage. It would not have been the end of the world since trains go both directions every hour, but it would have been a pain.
Now we are in Vernazza. The train from La Speczia to Vernazza goes right along the cost. The mountains drop so sharply to the sea that much of the train tracks between towns is through tunnels. Here is what our room looks like: http://www.acasa5terre.it/patrizia4.html
The sea does not have the same smell as Veracruz, San Diego or Savannah. I think it's because there's not much of a beach (no seaweed, etc.). It's another warm night, and unlike the convent, we don't have a fan. Hopefully a cool sea breeze will help make the night more tolerable.