river arno

The River Arno and The Leaning Tower

The guidebooks we read didn’t think that Pisa was that interesting, beyond the obvious attraction of the leaning tower of Pisa.

We found it a city that is much more than the leaning tower. It is very pleasant to wander the streets and broad boulevards. It has an entirely different feel to Florence; more open and spacious.

The Leaning Tower Of Pisa

Of course want to go to see the leaning tower and we got our first site of the tower as we walked down the street and turned a slight bend.

We gasped.

Oh boy, does it lean!

The leaning tower of pisa viewed from a distance

It isn’t always easy to convey the true look of something in a photograph. Cameras cause aberrations because they are not perfect. Camera lenses are a collection of lens elements designed work together to take photos of all kinds of distant and near scenes.

Then there are the distorting effects introduced by tilting the camera this way or that.

So it is not surprising that cameras sometimes distort the scene. Knowing that, we took particular care to hold the camera straight and level and not to tilt it upwards to get all of the tower in the shot.

Here is a shot where the people are upright, and the view of the ‘lean’ in the tower is pretty accurate.

the leaning tower of pisa with people standing near it

There was a question that was bubbling away in our minds, and that was to wonder what exactly the leaning tower of Pisa is? Of course, it is a tower. But what kind of tower and why was it built?

As we got near to the tower it became obvious that it was the campanile or bell tower for the Duomo, or church. It is a separate bell tower, not integrated into or connected to the main building. It’s the same in Florence, where the bell tower is a separate building.

leaning tower of pisa and duomo

At the far end of the Duomo, again separate from it, stands a most beautiful building. It is the baptistry. Unlike the octagonal baptistry in Florence, this one is circular. It reminds us of a crown such as Charlemagne might have worn into battle.

the baptistry in pisa

The River Arno at Pisa

Here’s a photo we took later that day as we crossed the Arno on our way to the train station. At just that moment, the sun shone briefly over the tops of the buildings and lit up the opposite bank.

The River Arno at Pisa

How To Enjoy The Uffizi Gallery

The Uffizi Gallery is known worldwide. And yet from the outside it is easy to overlook one of the most impressive aspects of the building, even when looking directly at it.

And that’s a pity, because you are missing out if you don’t take a few minutes to look at the outside of the building from across the river.

The Uffizi is just a few minutes walk from the famous Ponte Vecchio and next to the Palazzo Vecchio. Yet from the river it simply blends in to the panorama of buildings along the bank of the River Arno.

The Uffizi Gallery in Florence viewed from the-opposite bank of the River Arno

There it is with the three huge arches that take you into a quadrangle that recedes in a succession of arches. Because it is not locked away behind doors, it is easy to walk through it and simply not realise that it is the Uffizi at street-level.

And being open at both ends, it has the feel of a public space – perhaps the feel of a Roman forum.

Here are two people walking through the quadrangle. How modern.

At the same time we were struck by how, when seen from across the Arno, the people on the bank of the river look like figures from a Canaletto painting.

In some ways, time has not changed anything.

Columns in the quadrangle of The Uffizi Gallery in Florence

In the Gallery

Of course the treasures on view are wonderful and well worth seeing. But what stands out in our memory is the long, long corridor that connected the rooms on the upper floor.

corridor in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence