Friday 30 May 2003

British

Typical – we find the best local restaurant on our last full day in Italy. The day began with bedroom activities: breakfast in bed; reading in bed; honeymooning in bed. Having devoured Harpo Speaks (and Jamaica Inn), Tom is now progressing towards the climax of The Hippopotamus – he says he had forgotten how good they are. I have read the five books I brought with me and am now reading Tom's Harpo book, though the funny bits are not as funny in my version – mainly because Tom read out big chunks of the book when he was reading it.

In between bouts of packing – I packed, Tom assisted by staying out of my way – we managed to squeeze in a meal at San Francesco, a restaurant in Viareggio that we have spent the last two weeks driving past. The waiter brought me a complimentary glass of sparkling wine with the menus and seemed very bemused to find two English people in his restaurant. In this fish restaurant, Tom had fish whilst I was still did not feel like fish, having narrowly avoided growing a tail and fins only a few days previously. I had risotto with radichio for starters which was excellent; as were Tom's many and varied fish platters that constituted his starting course. The waiter kept bringing small plates containing delicious looking foods, placing them on the table saying, “this is for you” and pointing at Tom. For my main course, I munched on a fillet of very tasty beef drowning in an even tastier chef sauce (the sauce, not the chef, was tasty – well he might have been, but I did not go into the kitchen). Tom had tagliatelle with bite-sized pieces of fruit-del-mere such as prawns and crab that made each mouthful taste slightly different to the next. My wine was the perfect accompaniment, the bread was fresh, even the mineral water tasted a cut above the usual. Tom was glad he asked for the waiter’s favourite dessert when it arrived as it was a scrumptious looking bombe. Chocolate sauce, vanilla ice cream, whipped cream, bits of meringue and nuts all encased the central chocolate ice cream. By jove, it was good. Even my aversion to chocolate ice cream was overcome (without too much of a problem) because it looked so yummy – I just gave Tom the centre of mine; to which he replied, "I knew there was a good reason I married you" ... perfect.

We strolled around the centre of Viareggio rather than along the shoreline shops near the promenade. We found that window shopping is so much safer when the temptation to buy is removed due to shops being closed for the siesta. We went home for more packing (or hindrance avoiding) and ate our last supper. We decided that a very good end to the last day of our official honeymoon would be to watch the sun go down on the beach. We watched and photographed the sunset, then we decided to do a bit of Tai Chi in the sand as our teacher is always telling us to imagine the sand between our toes. What she did not say is that you cannot actually do Tai Chi in the sand because you sink down further with each move. I decided to have one last paddle and went a bit mad splashing around in the still very warm water. We drove around Viareggio watching the lights and sights and listening to the sounds – we were usually back safely in our villa by this kind of time. We went home to the green flashing behinds of the many fireflies flying around the villa grounds. A magical end to a lovely evening.