Day 6 - Cagliari

On this day we went to the town Cagliari on an island called Sardinia, which is right off the coast of Italy. We did not have anything that we really wanted to do in the town, so we did not get up very early. After we ate breakfast, we got off the ship, and decided to walk up to the castle on top of the hill, because that was really the only interesting thing there. There was not really a whole lot to see in the castle, it was pretty big, but there were really only four walls. The castle had a good view from the wall, but where we spent the most time was going to a museum inside of the castle. The museum had things from the island that were collections that people on the island used to own. There collections were tapestries, lace, dolls, and a couple of suits of traditional outfits. After we saw that part of the museum, we went down into the basement, where there were models of the castle and the town from 3 different time periods, and cisterns from the Roman empire. After that we went back to the ship, ate lunch, and went swimming (there was a water slide in the pool), then we ate dinner.Joshua, Rachel, and Stephen in the pool

The water slide was a lot of fun!

This castle has a lot of steps

The model of the castle in the museum.

A suit of the full-sized clothes.

Handwoven donkey blankets

Mommy and Daddy walking at the wall of the castle.

The dolls were dressed in clothes like they used to wear.

Blogging the Reformers: Aonio Paleario

Aonio Paleario

Read the introduction here.
This is from my reading in History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin by J. H. Merle D'Aubigne

Aonio Paleario was an Italian Reformer in the 16th century. He was born in 1503. In 1520 he went to Rome to study Homer, Virgil and the like, and in 1536 he published a poem in Latin. He began reading the scriptures and discovered the doctrine of justification by faith. He married, and had two sons and two daughters. Some monks formed a plot against him to convict him of heresy, but he defended himself and was declared innocent. Thirty years later he was arrested again for heresy. He was accused of denying purgatory and for saying that Christians are justified by faith alone (Sola Fide). He was hanged and then burnt in Rome on July 3rd, 1570. Many people forget that there was a small Reformation in Italy because it died out and we do not see fruits of it today.

Day 3 - Livorno, Italy

On the third day our port was Livorno, Italy. When we got off the ship we rented a car from a place that was right next to the cruise ship. We had to rent two small cars because they did not have any vans for 7 passengers. We decided to drive to through the Tuscany valley. Daddy, Mommy and I were in one car and Grandpa, Grandma, Rachel and Stephen were in the other. We had a GPS. They were following us, but we got separated when we were driving through a tunnel because Grandpa was looking at the map. After waiting for them to catch up with us and deciding they took the wrong fork coming out of the tunnel, we started driving into the Tuscany valley. In the Tuscany valley they grow olives and grapes. We stopped at a town called Volterra, because we saw a castle on top of a hill. It was a midieval village and when we got to the castle, we could only walk around it because it is used as a prison. We walked around the village, then decided we should head toward San Gimignano, since that is where we told Grandma we were going. When we got there, we saw Grandpa parking the other car! They did not remember that we were supposed to meet them there, but providentially they had asked someone about a castle, and they said that this was a good one. They had been lost for awhile and kept stopping to ask directions. Once they pulled into a driveway to turn around, and then the gate closed behind them! They had to go ask the owners to open it, in Italian (Grandma knows a very little Spanish and even less Italian.)

San Gimignano is a walled midieval town. It had 72 towers at one time, but now less than 20 survive. We first ate lunch in a "real" italian restaurant and most of us had spaghetti bolognese, but Stephen tried pasta with wild boar sauce. We all like Mommy's spaghetti better! Then we walked around the town, and saw the towers and the medieval castle. We also went in some of the shops. After awhile we started driving back. We wanted to drive by the leaning tower of Pisa, but when we got there we did not have time, so we stayed on the highway. We did get a picture of the top though.

Castle at Volterra

The countryside

Towers at San Gimignano


Us in the medieval castle