Yesterday we said “arrividerci, Roma” as we boarded the Celebrity Reflection to begin our Mediterranean tour.  Because the kids were a bit tired after we ran them all over Rome, we had a low key day of lounging by the ship’s pool.

Today, our ship stopped in La Spezia, Italy, which is a jumping off point in Tuscany for Pisa, Florence, and Cinque Terre.  We opted to head into Pisa to see the famous leaning tower. We took a tour into Pisa that gave us some time to explore the town on our own. We saw the tower…and tried to take the perfect “holding the tower up” photos.  I’m not sure we were exactly successful with the kids, but we tried!

After wandering through Pisa, we headed to Veraggio, which is apparently a beach holiday destination for Italians.  We strolled down the strip and ate pizza and and drank some wine before planting our stuff in beach chairs at Nettuno Beach Club and enjoying some sun for the afternoon.

The sand was super fine…but it must be volcanic because it had a lot of black particles in it and it was HOT!  I’m sure we looked hilarious sprinting across the sand to make it to the water to cool our feet.  The water was pretty calm, very shallow, and was nice and warm.  We were able to see some fish jumping out of the water while we were swimming (although we couldn’t point that out to Belinda, who for some reason is terrified of fish in the ocean, even after all her beach trips).

After the beach, we had about a 45 minute trip back to the ship…and all of us were tired from our day of sea and sand because we all fell asleep!  Tomorrow, we head to Nice, France, for a bit of old city sightseeing.  It’s another early morning, so hopefully we get a chance to sleep in soon!