Leaving Florence

I did not sleep last night. I tried all the usual tricks, singing songs very slow, counting backwards, reading, taking tylenol PM and I was still wide awake at 3:30 and then finally drifted off only to wake up at 8:30 ready to go. I still don't know if I will sleep tonight. I get over-stimulated when I travel especially to Europe.


Mark and I took one more stroll around Florence and joined our whole biking group at noon, boarded a nice bus and drove to Cecina to the Agrihotel Elisabetta. 


We met with our guides Luigi and Matteo for our daily briefing and we all started off on our warm-up ride of 8 miles to make sure our equipment worked to our liking.

Stacy found a fig tree and we picked some fresh figs. It was our first time tasting figs other than fig newtons. We both really liked them.
                            

Cooling off in the deep pool with friends talking and laughing, it is quite hot and humid here.

                            
After a swim, we had a wine tour and tasting. I know 14 out of 20 of us don't drink, so I spoke to our guide and asked him if he could arrange some fresh grape juice for us instead. He was successful and it was good. We enjoyed learning about wine-making though and the owner was a lot of fun. He also makes his own olive oil.

 Our two guides Luigi and Matteo with the owner in the middle.

Dinner was spectacular, but after the juice and the perfect Parmesan cheese, I couldn't enjoy it as much as I wanted to because I was too full. I won't make the same mistake tomorrow night.

I love our group of friends. We laugh and have so much fun together. This is our fifth trip together for ten of us.