We arrived early to Livorno but the busses took a while to get loaded and take us to our destination.

We stopped for gelato at an amazing place called Bar La Terraza with majestic views of the Tuscan countryside.

We decided to take a look at a few of the properties for sale in the area. peccioli is an amazing place nestled on a hill overlooking the Tuscan countryside with cool breeze blowing through and wine country keeping the soul nourished.

We stopped by a local church where our group would assemble for our next stop: Winery.

After our walking site visit it was off to lunch and wine tasting.

Meanwhile in the other side of the Tuscan hills…

Back to the ship and our final stop Rome.

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We arrived early in the morning to Naples.

We drove about 40 minutes to Gragnano to visit an old pasta maker named Pastificio Cuomo. We got a tour of the facility and rich pasta making history of the area.

This whole street had pasta vendors at one point but now there are mostly shuttered retail outlets.

We sat down for lunch which included a cold plate appetizer with the fresh mozzarella being the highlight. The pasta was good but the tomato sauce stole the show.

The current owner of Pasta Cuomo said he may be the last family member to produce pasta given mass production and economies of scale with larger producers. If this is true it will be a sad day for the original pasta street.

Before we left Naples, we had to try a slice of pizza so we stopped by this place near the port called Cafe Beverello and the Legend of Dutch could be seen wolfing down slice after slice of pizza.

After our pizza, it was time to head back to the ship for our second to last stop.

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We arrived at Catania at 7 am and this industrial port seemed a bit different than all the other ports we have visited. We are taking a bus later in the day to Taormina.

There is a spectacular view of Mt Etna from the stern of the ship.

We drove an hour to Taormina but once we got there it was amazing.

We stopped and had lunch at Amigos Bar and I warned that if they didnt have a wood oven cooking the pizza it would be as good as they were expecting and sure enough it wasnt cooked in a wood fire oven!

We stopped by for a few items then boarded the bus back to Catania. We leave for Naples this evening.

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