Delayed from 30th August..With an extra day before my dad arrived (nothing at all to do with me getting the dates wrong…ahem) we decided to take the local train (only 5minutes from the campsite) to Lucca. I had heard many good things about Lucca and as we read the book on the train there I was even more excited as it was described as being as beautiful as Florence and Pisa but without all the tourists.

20 minutes later we arrived in Lucca and made out way to the historic city walls – you have to go through arches and passage ways to get in and then are confronted with quite a large expanse of beautiful buildings. It being lunch time (seem to be talking more and more about food!) we happened upon a little wine bar/restaurant which had advertised outside as being a lonely planet top choice. We were not disappointed. Run by an English Lady and her Dutch husband their emphasis is on local produce – we opted for the taster menu meaning we were given three local wines, a plate of local meats and a plate of local cheese with honey followed by coffee. While not necessarily a traditional Italian establishment the food and wine was devine and we left ready for an afternoon of wandering.

Dave was in charge of the map and took us to a church where Puccini’s grandfather and father were the organists – playing a very grand and intricately designed organ. We then took to wandering the streets (as by now you know I love) and spent the afternoon gazing at the beautiful buildings and peeking in shop windows. As a tourist town Lucca lacks actual monuments, museums etc which suited us well as we didn’t feel we were missing out by just walking about.

On our route out we passed an Italian barber reading his paper waiting for his next customer. Three months in and with only one slightly average haircut from me Dave was getting a little long on top so with a deep breath and encouragement from me he went inside. Thankfully having brought the language book with us we managed to communicate a cut with scissors not razors and that he wanted to keep it long not too short. The scissors bit was understood but after half an hour (I have shorter hair cuts!) there was a shockingly large amount of hair on the floor! Having said that I have never seen anyone take more care of a hair cut – it was a brilliant experience to watch such care and skill.

Lucca is a wonderful place with a much more relaxed atmosphere than many of the larger and more tourist lead places. With a huge number of bars and restaurants as well as shops it is easy to soak up the Italian atmosphere with out any pressure and therefore somehow that makes it an even better experience.

We headed back to camp and were treated to a night of one of our top 5 huge thunderstorms of the trip. Something special about camping is that when the thunder starts rumbling on the horizon at 2am rather than staying inside the campsite comes to life. All you could hear were tents being unzipped and doors slamming as everyone got up and made sure their tents we pegged down, the clothes came off the line, chairs are out away and everyone nips to the toilet block before they can not longer go outside. I don’t think anyone went back to sleep after that – we were certainly still awake at 5am when it began to subside. I think we didn’t get the worst of it as when Dad tried to take his flight the following morning their we’re reports of hail stones the size of golf balls and winds so high his plane was delayed.

Nevertheless he took flight and we packed up and headed to meet him at the airport….dad’s sunny Tuscany break was looking a little less likely by the minute…