Road Trip To Italy: Day 1 in Pisa and Florence

Waking up at one in the morning was not much fun, but somehow knowing that in several hours Hubby and I would be in Tuscany made it all worthwhile. We estimated that it would take about 11 hours to drive from Split to Pisa so we wanted to get an early start. I prepared breakfast burritos, a habit I inherited from my Mother. You see, anytime we went on any sort of trip, she would wake up very early and prepare our food basket: consisting of yogurt, cookies, fruit, chile con queso and homemade tortillas rolled up with potatoes and eggs. My tortillas weren't homemade but the burritos were just as tasty.

We headed north towards Rijeka. We crossed the Slovenian border and entered Italy at exactly seven in the morning. We expected to get lost and we did! We missed our exit to Pisa and had to drive 57 kilometers south of Florence before we could exit the highway to drive west. We joked that if we were on the Amazing Race we would have been eliminated by now!

The leaning tower in Pisa! The realization that we were finally here left me speechless, and for the first few minutes I was walking around in awe.
We walked outside the medieval walls and were literally swarmed with people who sold counterfit items like belts, sunglasses and bags, this is illegal and you won't see them within the city walls as police are on the premises. We politely said, "No thank you," over and over again but they were quite insistent!

Campo dei Miracoli, fields of miracles.

After several hours we said goodbye to Pisa. We wanted to drive with enough daylight so we could find our hotel in downtown Florence.

In spite of looking at maps, sightseeing books, and google map on our cell phone, we managed to get lost in the small streets. We circled around and around in our car and then managed to drive on a pedestrian only zone and the pedestrians had to jump into the sidewalks to make room for us. Mi dispiace!

Both of us kept our patience and we simply stopped and asked for directions. When we finally checked in and walked into our room, our hotel window surprised us with this wonderful view, as if saying, welcome to Florence!

We unpacked and got ready for our first night in the city. We walked without direction and stumbled upon the restaurant Tira Baralla and had a delicious dinner while we toasted to our first night in Italy!

Duomo, we shall see you tomorrow.