Sunday's First Stop is Carrara, Italy

Driving to Carrara

We left Porto Venere and headed south to the agriturismo near Volterra where we spent the next few days. As the marble quarries of Carrara are on the way we decided to stop and get some photos.

Here are some views along the way.

The mountains just outside the town of Carrara. The white from the quaries can be seen from many miles away.

Another view of the mountains

Sunday morning in Carrara

I stopped and parked the car so I could get some photos from the drive up the mountains.
This is a view of the town of Carrara. The mountains are behind us and are not actually in Carrara.

Here is a good view of the mountains and the quaries.
You can just imagine how tall the mountains used to be and how much they have been lowered by the quarry operations that have taken place here over the centuries. And imagine artists like Michelangelo prowling the area searching for good pieces of marble for the next masterpiece.

This is the car we rented from Hertz, a Fiat Panda. There was only room in the hatchback for one suitcase, so we had to put the other one in the back seat.
You can see the sign in front of the car that appears to say, No Parking. Tow Away Zone. We just stopped to take some photos and didn't stray far from the car.

The next few photos are some views of the mountains and other sights from various vantage points as we made our way up the mountain roads.

A canto from Dante's Inferno

Marble Sculptures

I do not know why there is a US flag on the front of this train

A little friend we saw along the way.

The operations at Carrara are still ongoing.

And here is a rural scene we saw high up in the mountains.

A cemetery in Carrara

As we made our way back down toward the city of Carrara, we came across this cemetery and stoped to take a few photos.

A chapel.

Inside the chapel.

A nice view with the mountains in the background.

The crypt of the Lazzarini family.

Grape Vines

There were some grape vines near the cemetery and Karen took these photos of them.

As we got back down into the town of Carrara, we needed to get some gas. I stopped at a gas station and found that it was diesel only. This is something we do not see in the US. So I got the GPS to find me a nearby gas station and it brought me to one that had gasoline.

There was no attendant there at the gas station, the pumps took credit cards. I was a little confused about which pump to use, but fortunately there was someone else getting gas and he showed me how to match the green handle with the green insert inside the gas filler on the car. So with a little help we got the tank filled.

And then it was on to the agriturismo, Podere San Lorenzo near Volterra.