Day 133 Trees of my hearts desire !

Wednesday 01/08/2018 Day (Day 46 SZ) Karma Borgo Di Colleoli Via Panoramica 20 56036 Palaia Colleoli (PI) Tuscany Italy

The NP Maccas... onto lidil Lucca, and the bridge the man villages back...

My day will be wonderful I had hoped... and it was...for over 12 months I have wanted to go to this National Park in Italy....well to be honest I didn’t know until about 3 mots before our trip that where I had planned to was even a NP....I had seen these amazing unreal pictures on Instagram that depicted these unique tree lined arch..
From then on all I have wanted to do was head to where this place was..... I had to do research to find it but once I did find out where it was, it was funny because I had been last the place they were about 3 times at least and it was at Pisa in Italy...however unless you know where they are you wouldn’t know at all....

So when I put together this trip and the places to visit no matter what else happened I had to go here...So when I finally made it I was blown away No 1 by how easy it was to find I really thought it would take ages..... No 2 how awesome they really looked in real life... I told John after it was a highlight of our trip....When we arrived we drove in towards the main office about to buy our NP TICKET..but just as we turned in after the entrance I spotted this massive line of tree 🌳...tall pine tree type trees that went down a straight for about 7 Ks all planted in 1979, just so interesting...The Italians call it Reginal Park Migliarino SAN Rossore....

Before we actually made it to The NP we had to have an appt with Macca who was just up the road so worked in brilliantly!

So we parked up and set out in foot me taking so many pics between the iphone 📲 and my Nikon..... we walked for about 2.5 is down and didn’t seem to be getting very far.. you weren’t allowed to drive down this road...there were locals walking it and getting into my pics but looking at them now they actually add to the perspective of the whole view... with big no entry signs around we were sure it was for cars .... next thing we know there is a car driving down past us...so much for that law we said..
At the 2.5 mask we decided to head back and as we did this other car cam driving towards us..l next thing this guy starts talking in Italian and waving his hands about and saying something to me... we said something to him in English,next thing he told us it’s not allowed to come past the barrier... which wasn’t barred off but a barrier evidently....we thanked him for his directions... we were hearing back anyway... when we got to the signs which were all in Italian except the fine print down the bottom... no one allowed past the point without a guide... which you guessed it costs...
anyway naughty as I am I didn’t care as I had my pics anyway...

We got back to the car and headed off to Lidl to do some shopping... then we are to head to Lucca....

Heading to Lidl we had to pass along and slightly under this amazing looking ancient Aquaduct in Pisa, we have been here 3 times and never knew it existed...got our shopping done, I even managed to score a red dress for cheap as chips..So happy with that....then off to Lucca not that far from Pisa but over 1/2 way there we followed the unreal Aquaduct quite a distance along the Hwy through some smaller villages ... 8ks all up, which I am guessing is only a small amount of what’s left...
onto Lucca, which we have been to a couple of years ago.. but only drove in and drove out... now we can look slower...

Lucca was so hot today... so looking did become a bit of a chore and we didn’t have a huge amount of time... so it was a quick whip around..and yet again so much to take in so many church’s, Piazzas, statues and people to get around, in between, then the cars in what really shouldn’t be a car area just too many people, and lastly push bikes going here there and everywhere... it really made it very difficult to get around and actually enjoy the experience...plus now I have new shoes 👟 and they are rubbing my little toe so badly I can feel a blister starting already... John had only had a ticket for just over an hour... we scored there went to by a ticket to park the car, some guy was leaving and offered us his.... which was great of him but didn’t give us a lot of time....

What was fascinating about Lucca was all the marble sculptures massive ones dotted all over the old city... at the entrance of the city gates in Piazzas/Squares, out the front of Cathedrals which I did think was a bit odd..l but all in all there were heaps around....

The mountains behind a Lucca are where they mine the marble and from our last trip here, there are yard after yard, village after village all displaying statues or sell marble in their yards... it’s huge business here and as nearly every building has some sort of marble in it, be it window sills, steps, bench tops, tables ++++ of items made from marble in Italy... even some streets have marble gutters... and in Pompeii the footpaths had a mixture of marble and cobblestones.... fascinating to see how it’s used... so common and we pay so much for it...

Once I had, had a fairly good look around, John had gone back to the car as we didn’t want to get booked... I could have spent another hour here, but we still had a couple more places to go to...

So I hit footed back to the car with an extremely painful little toe with every step it hurt more and more... onward we headed to Ponte Della Maddalena... this is a 95m arched medieval bridge built in 1080-1100 and renovated again in 1300 and in 1900’s slightly changed after a huge flood... either way this unreal feat of architecture once again blew us away... its other name is Ponte del Diavolo meaning Bridge of the Devil.. I can’t for the life if me work out why it would be called after Mary Magdalene then called the Bridge of the Devil.. very odd..either way this piece of ancient medieval history is unbelievable with how it was made..
into below....Just being on it and seeing how it structure is today knowing it was all by hand blows your mind...interesting and unreal to see for sure...


We finished up with a cuppa across the road then hit the track home... we passed through village after village some scientists, some modern, some really tiny only a few homes others with massive shopping centres....

We finished off we our night at the Restaurant next door, who would have thought it would be packed mid week but unreal the people in what appears to be a country area, no shops around, just a couple of restaurants and the place is crawling with people.... and if it’s not the digs they bring it’s the cats that roam the restaurant at your table begging for food... unreal... kids, dogs and cats like a crazy place at times....

A huge day both tired so off to bed tomorrow’s another adventure or maybe...

Info thanks to Wiki all copyrights theirs!

Ponte della Maddalena (Italian: "Bridge of Mary Magdalene") is a bridge crossing the Serchio river near the town of Borgo a Mozzano in the Italian province of Lucca.One of numerous medieval bridges known as Ponte del Diavolo, the "Bridge of the Devil", it was a vital river crossing on the Via Francigena, an early medieval road to Rome for those coming from France that was an important medieval pilgrimage route.
The bridge is a remarkable example of medieval engineering, probably commissioned by the Countess Matilda of Tuscany c. 1080-1100. It was renovated c. 1300 under the direction of Castruccio Castracani. The largest span is 37.8 m. The bridge is also described in a 14th-century novella by Giovanni Sercambi of Lucca.
Circa 1500 it took on the name of Ponte della Maddalena, from an oratory dedicated to Mary Magdalene, whose statue stood at the foot of the bridge on the eastern bank.
In 1670 the General Council of the Republic of Lucca issued a decree prohibiting passage over the bridge with millstones (ceppi) and sacks of flour in order to preserve the structure.
In 1836, after being badly damaged during a flood, the bridge underwent urgent repair work. In the early 1900s in order to make room for the surfaced roadway an additional arch was added to the right hand section, considerably altering the original design.

With an arched structure like it’s lunging towards the shore, the Ponte della Maddalena near the Italian village of Borgo a Mozzano has earned the title of Ponte del Diavolo, or Devil’s Bridge.
Its official name in Italian means the Bridge of Mary Magdalene, yet it’s better known by its more satanic nickname. This likely comes from its staggering shape, a feat of engineering for the 11th century when it was constructed. It spans 131 over the Serchio River and is 60 feet tall at the peak of its highest of the five asymmetrical arches.
One story goes that the Countess Matilde di Canossa commissioned it so she could reach the thermal baths. However, the more popular legend is that the villagers, facing difficulties in completing their complicated bridge, made a pact with the devil to finish its construction. In exchange he would get the soul of the first to cross it (a common devil-building-bridge deal). Supposedly, the clever townspeople sent a dog over first, although it’s unclear if the poor dog then faced eternal damnation or if a frustrated devil just stormed away to try again elsewhere. 
Now it’s more a favorite photography spot that river crossing, although it’s recommended that you do. While the legends of the devil are almost definitely that of myth, there’s an unsettling feeling evoked by stepping over those wavering arches. Leia mais