Hello from Pergine Valdarno

We are off to Rome but leave our little Tuscan hamlet with fond memories. We stumbled upon the quintessential tuscan village yestrday. A total of 20 people inhabit it on top of a hill overlooking vineyards and olive groves. We sampled local bruschetta and mamma's home made cake- completely yum.
A couple of wierd and unexpected things have occured on our travels but none more strange than the things in Pergine Valdarno. The village was built in 700 AD (the rooms we stayed in were in the basement of a building over 1200 years old) and there are no cars allowed in the village square which is only the size of a large block of land. But last night, we were entertained by the local singers, musicians and actors, in a charity concert to raise money for Haiti. So at 9.30pm on a Sunday night in the middle of Chianti, heavy metal rock was played for 100 of the locals who braved the cool night. Very strange.
But even stranger was the appearance of two black ladies, dressed in "city" attire, sitting on the side of the road on the way to Sienna. At first site, we thought this stange but decided they must be waiting for the bus. When we observed the next person waiting for the bus on the same road was also a dark woman, we thought it strange again. When another two dark ladies were observed 500 meters up the road we were sure something was up. We discovered there was a bikie convention a little further along the road to Sienna. Ah!! now it makes sense (kind of). It was after all, the middle of the day in the middle of Tuscany on a saturday afternoon. Very strange things in this part of the world.
We are off to Rome and then hoping the volcano will calm down long enough for us to fly to Cairo. There is a strong sense of dodging disaster on this trip. We have spent the last three days navigating our way through unmarked streets and driving on the wrong side of the road. We have had to keep our wits about us at all times. But some how, remarkabley, we make it from one spot to the next, still in tact. Turns out Toms' a great driver and I'm a great navigator :)
Sounds a lot like our marriage
Speak soon.
Love to Tom, Lauren and Ash, Rachael, Michael, Ramsey, Anna and Isla