Day 4 - Hanging out around Lucca

Tuesday, we were planning a relatively quiet day.  After sleeping in a bit, we decided to go for a nice little walk around the area.  We started out - four of us: Caroline, Anne-Marie, Wardie and myself - walking up a nice road, and coming across a small foot path.

Looked OK, but soon became obvious that this was going to be more of a hike than a walk.  So we unfortunately lost Anne-Marie and Caroline - and their flip-flops, who returned back to the Villa and its pool.

Wardie and I continued, and I must admit, got way more than I bargained for.  This was a serious hike - uphill for about 2.5 kilometers, through wooded trails and back country roads.  Here's a view of the Tuscan landscape around Lucca from about half way up our climb.

Despite the gruelling climb in quite hot and humid weather, at the mid-day point when the sun is at its highest and hottest, the hike was really quite nice.  We saw what you would expect to see on a hike through Tuscany:

Old churches,

vineyards, 

and of course, goats.

Arriving back down the hill, this long and lovely road back into the village where we found our villa and a very inviting swimming pool...

After freshening up and feeling good about that unplanned workout, we headed out for lunch, and then into the city of Lucca for :

Yes - I happen to be in Italy, and there just happens to be an open air Leonard Cohen concert, and I MUST GO!!!

But first, we spend some time wandering the streets of Lucca, and out of nowhere, this marching band pops up.

We stopped for a quick supper at a sidewalk cafe.  Here's the whole gang - sans moi - since I'm taking the photo.

Then I'm off to the concerts - sous la belle étoile.  Needless to say, it was wonderful.  A full 3 hours of Leonard Cohen.  He sang all his most famous songs, plus...  Some I even forgot momentarily that he had written until he started singing, and I was in awe (like Hallelujah.)

Out of respect for my fellow concert goers, I did not take many photos of the event - instead allowing myself to get lost in the beautiful music.  However, here is a scene of the stage shortly before he came on...

...and I did get this photo of him practising during his warm-up in the afternoon.  He actually came out and sang 4 songs as a sound-check, as the crowd gathered and became bigger and bigger.

Really lucky to have been here and come across this concert.  I thoroughly enjoyed seeing a fellow Canadian here on stage. 

Right now, it's the end of Day 5, and we spent the day today in CinqueTerre.  I'll have more photos and stories about that soon.  Stay tuned.