Speaker 1: 0:07

Welcome to the Z Michelson Travel Podcast, where every journey is a story waiting to be told. I'm your host, z Michelson, and I'm so excited to take you on a ride through the world's most incredible destinations, hidden gems and unforgettable experiences. Whether you're a seasoned traveler or just starting to plan your next getaway, you're in the right place. Each episode, we'll be diving into everything from must-see landmarks to off-the-beaten-path treasures, speaking with locals and travel experts and sharing stories that will inspire your next adventure. So sit back, relax and let's wander the world together, one destination at a time. Are you ready? Let's get started. Hi, and welcome back to the Zee Martinson Travel Podcast, and I am here again with Diana from Celtic Tours.

Speaker 2: 1:03

Hello Zee.

Speaker 1: 1:08

And you know we keep talking Celtic Tours. Hello Zing, and you know we keep talking Celtic Tours, but now we're talking Celtic Tours. Take you to Italy. Yes, and you were talking about Italy. We are now on day three of your Italy tour.

Speaker 2: 1:15

We are. So where are we going today? We are going to Pisa, and then we're going to this farm for an amazing, what we call a light lunch.

Speaker 1: 1:27

A light lunch, and then to luca so again, you're staying in the thing casa villa grande, villa casa grande, so yeah. So I mean, and this is a beautiful place, yeah, and it's kind of like you're staying there for the entire several days and you're there, yep, and then just going out to all these different locations, which is kind of cool.

Speaker 2: 1:49

This way you can unpack. Yeah, you can unpack and you stay in one place the entire time. It's a hotel spa. It's actually almost a five star. I mean it has a spa, pools, restaurants, two restaurants. It's right there, by a beautiful little town. I probably wouldn't even want to go anywhere. I just want to sit there and relax and enjoy it. Well, there are days where you have some free time where you can do that, you can just relax. You can do the spa, you can relax, enjoy the restaurants and all of that.

Speaker 1: 2:17

You also said that every day you get breakfast. You do Breakfast daily, so day three you had breakfast.

Speaker 2: 2:22

Yes, we had breakfast, I go down and I get my cappuccino.

Speaker 1: 2:26

Right, you got to have cappuccino, my double expresso cappuccino. Double, expresso Double expresso cappuccino.

Speaker 2: 2:32

So yeah, we went down, had breakfast and again the breakfast is kind of a buffet style.

Speaker 1: 2:37

Which is nice.

Speaker 2: 2:38

Yeah, I mean, a lot of American food isn't typical in Italy, but because this is a hotel that a lot of Americans are there, so they kind of, you know, catered to us a little bit for the breakfast. So we had eggs and sausage and then you have your regular, you know, muffins and breads and you know, of course, I had to have my cappuccino. That was it.

Speaker 1: 2:56

Just to get you ready for the day, yeah, so now you're all getting on the motor coach. Yeah, it's, fully air conditioned it is, and nice, nice.

Speaker 2: 3:03

Very comfortable Wash. You're right Nice.

Speaker 1: 3:06

Very comfortable motor coach and you're heading to Pisa, pisa.

Speaker 2: 3:10

The Leaning Tower. We're at the Leaning Tower, yep, that's what it's known for. And it's about an hour, an hour and a half drive from where we were located.

Speaker 2: 3:17

So it was a little bit of a drive. So beautiful just to watch the Tuscany and see the countryside, and even though you're on the highways there's still so much to see, and so it's a really, really beautiful drive. I didn't I really don't mind the drives and most of the locations that we go. Of course motor coach goes a little bit slower than a car or slower than a train, so the distance from one place to another is a little bit longer. But again you're very comfortable, the air conditioned motor coach.

Speaker 1: 3:48

very comfortable seats, some people, you know if they had a long night.

Speaker 2: 3:50

The night before they'll take a little snooze, a little snooze, you know, or a snooze between locations.

Speaker 1: 3:52

So it's very comfortable Now when you go onto the motor coach. How many people are with you on this particular tour?

Speaker 2: 3:58

This particular tour we had 27.

Speaker 1: 4:00

Oh 20. Yeah, 27 people and it's still not a lot compared to some other companies that do tours. Yeah, and this was a private tour, this was a private tour that I put together for a client yeah.

Speaker 2: 4:11

So she wanted to keep it small and again, that's what Celtic tours can do.

Speaker 1: 4:16

Yeah, If somebody wants to say, do a family reunion type of thing, you know, say hey, we're going to go here or we're going to go there, you can actually do something like that, yeah, and you don't have to do a motor coach.

Speaker 2: 4:26

You know we can do a small family group. Multi-generational is really really big right now. So, yeah, very big. So grandma can take the entire family with the grandchildren and do like a Mercedes Sprinter and we can customize the entire tour for them, so it's really nice.

Speaker 1: 4:40

It them, so it's really nice. It makes it nice. Yeah, so now you're in this motorcoach, you're heading off to Pisa and get to Pisa, and what are you doing?

Speaker 2: 4:47

Oh, so we meet our guide Now. Again, I mentioned, I think, in the last couple of podcasts there is a lot of walking and there are still a lot of walking because they don't drop us off right there by right in the town center and in the center of Pisa. So you do have to walk a little bit. So it's probably about four or five block walk from where they drop you off. It's not bad, but you are walking through some streets cobblestone streets and so it's a little bit of a walk.

Speaker 1: 5:13

So I like to tell it Wear comfortable shoes, wear comfortable shoes.

Speaker 2: 5:17

This is not a fashion contest. When you're going over to Europe, you know, and just make sure that you're very, very comfortable. So we meet our guide and then we go ahead and we take a walk and we go over to the historical plaza, which is where the Leaning Tower of Pisa is. And, of course, the cathedral square. The piazza is actually called Piazza del Domo, so that's where the cathedral is. That's where the baptismal is and, of course, the famous Leaning Tower. Leaning Tower.

Speaker 1: 5:50

Yeah, everybody doing the pictures, oh my goodness, yes.

Speaker 2: 5:54

It's really really funny to just sit there and watch you know, everybody try it, and they're doing it from all over the place, you know. So it's really kind of funny. I actually took a picture of somebody who wasn't really into the whole leaning tower, but as she just kind of props her hands up there, like here.

Speaker 2: 6:11

I am. You know I made it, so it's funny. Now tell me, can you go into the leaning tower? So you can. You can go into actually all of them. So this is the second time I've been to Pisa and actually all of them. So this is the second time I've been to Pisa and the first time everything was closed. We couldn't go into anything whatsoever. This time everything was open the baptismal was open, the church, the cathedral was open and the walk to the Leaning Tower of Pisa. But to get inside Pisa, they can only allow so many people in at a time and the baptismal as well.

Speaker 2: 6:43

They only allow so many people at a time, so I believe there is a place where you can go get tickets, right, but you can purchase the tickets to get into those Now would Celtic Tours help?

Speaker 1: 6:52

if somebody says I want to go in and they would actually do this for their, we could do that for them?

Speaker 2: 6:57

Yeah, if they wanted to do it for you. But not everybody wants to go into the tower because I think there's oh my gosh, and I don't remember exactly, but it must have been like, I think, 270 stairs or 280 stairs plus.

Speaker 1: 7:13

I mean, I've been in the Statue of Liberty so I could understand.

Speaker 2: 7:16

Oh, no, oh, not fun at all, but so, anyway, you can definitely go in. But the cathedral itself you can walk into the cathedral, and I did walk into the cathedral and they had an actual mass at the time, so you couldn't go all the way to the front Right, because they had it blocked off for the tourists, right. Pisa was so crowded the day that we were there because of the Jubilee.

Speaker 2: 7:46

Oh yes, I could not believe how many people were actually there Right. So I walk into the cathedral they kind of have it roped off and just to sit there and be in awe of this beautiful cathedral and watch this religious service going on, and the music, the piping of the organ and the choir, it was absolutely just amazing and stunning.

Speaker 1: 8:10

It does pull you in it really really does. No matter what religion you are, and that's something people should see, because they can see how people celebrate things. And again, these buildings are old. Yeah, it's a very old building. Oh, absolutely, and to see that kind of architecture is amazing, yeah, and so you did a lot of running around Pisa.

Speaker 2: 8:32

So yeah, our guide took us all over the place and then she gave us some free time to kind of walk around, before we all just headed back to the motor coach. So we walked around and everybody took pictures. Probably I would probably say we were there about an hour and a half to two hours.

Speaker 1: 8:47

About two hours. That's enough time.

Speaker 2: 8:49

Yeah, and if anybody wanted to go into the baptismal or they wanted to go into anything, else they could. But, like I said, it was very, very crowded this particular day. It was actually a Sunday, oh yes, so a lot of people were attending the services and things.

Speaker 1: 9:05

Yeah, so yeah.

Speaker 2: 9:11

So now everybody's getting back on the bus, yeah, we're all getting back on the motor coach, and then we're heading to a farm town for what we call and I'm using air quotes a light lunch. Now, I will never use the term light lunch again. I use the term very, very lightly right now because it was not light. Let me tell you. So we get to this farmhouse, right, and what town was it in? Do you remember? You know it was between and I don't, it was between Pisa and Lucca. Oh, ok, so it was right between the two.

Speaker 2: 9:42

Yeah, so it was kind of on our way to Lucca and we go and we meet somebody and they take us to the vineyards to show us the vineyards and they show us the olive trees, where they make the olives and they kind of explain how the process works with their fresh olive oil and they explain the process with the wine. They have six different wines that they offer. Did you get to taste the olive oil?

Speaker 1: 10:04

I did, of course, I bought olive oil. Again the shopper here and me Great.

Speaker 2: 10:11

Got to shop. I bought two bottles of wine and I bought some olive oil and a couple other things. So anyway, but then we go ahead and they take us to our own table. It was a very, very long family style table. We're back all by ourselves, and then they, you know the bread on the table with their olive oil. So you can have the bread with the olive oil and of course I put a little bit of balsamic vinegar in it, with a little bit of pepper.

Speaker 1: 10:35

You got to spice it up a little bit, exactly, and olive oil must have tasted, so fresh it's just absolutely amazing olive oil.

Speaker 2: 10:46

Just amazing because it comes right there. I mean, they make it right there, right there, let me bring our first course. It was a Bolognese pasta with the thick, and I'm not going to try and butcher the names of these dishes, you know, because I will. I unfortunately don't speak Italian, but it had the really thick noodles with a Bolognese and, oh my goodness, was this amazing?

Speaker 1: 11:09

And I like how you said the first course. First course For this light lunch, for this light lunch.

Speaker 2: 11:14

Yeah, yeah, again, I use air quotes light lunch. And we were expecting that, because that's what we were told. It's going to be a light lunch. So yeah, then comes the second course. Right, and they have different cheeses. They bring different cheeses and meats and, like an appetizer, then they bring meats, an assortment Trays of meat Chicken, ribs, beef.

Speaker 1: 11:49

It was just an assortment of all of this meat. And now people should realize we, as Americans, we're always rushing our meals. Yes, you know, if we can eat a meal in five minutes, we're good. Overseas in Europe, people like to enjoy the food, so they take their time enjoying what they're eating. Yes, so all these courses that are coming at you are something to be savored and enjoyed.

Speaker 2: 12:09

Oh, absolutely. And, of course, don't forget about the wine that's flowing and the wine right, because they want us to sample their wine right, that they actually produce there at the farm, and the wine was just, and I'm sure they had a different wine with the different meals coming at you yes and no, yes and no. You know, they kind of just say, okay, they put, they put the light white and the light red in the beginning and then they bring the darker ones out with the meat.

Speaker 2: 12:36

you know they have a darker, a darker red reserve that they served with the meat. So it was, but oh, my goodness, this, it was so much so much food.

Speaker 1: 12:45

So we had the pasta in the beginning, then we had the assorted cheeses.

Speaker 2: 12:50

Then the assorted meats.

Speaker 1: 12:52

You can't tell me they didn't serve a dessert.

Speaker 2: 12:54

Well, no, they gave us a dessert, but it was a dessert liqueur, and I think I mentioned this in one of my podcasts. This is very, very typical for Italy. They have what's called a digestiva, so it's grappa. Grappa, which is a liqueur, an Italian liqueur, and you pour it into like a whiskey glass about a quarter of the way full, and then you take a biscotti and you drop a biscotti in it and leave it in for about 10, 15 seconds, and then you eat the biscotti and it's supposed to be a digestiva. Now I had five of those biscottis I'm not sure it was a digestiva at that point and then two glasses of the grappa. So I'm not sure how much of a digestiva that was it was good.

Speaker 1: 13:40

It was an after meal, it was A little sweet.

Speaker 2: 13:44

Yeah, I mean it's really really good, because the liqueur is not real sweet, it has a bittersweetness to it and dipping the biscotti in it with the almond taste from the biscotti, it just soaks it right up. And it just really really gives it a great flavor?

Speaker 1: 14:01

Yeah, I would imagine it would. I love biscotti. It is very tasty and now you're dipping it in this and can taste the element.

Speaker 2: 14:09

Yeah, it really brings out the cookie flavor.

Speaker 1: 14:12

So you're having all these other things and you're having a very light dessert.

Speaker 2: 14:16

Yeah, Well, I mean, it was supposed to be light until I just kept eating them and eating them you know, that's the thing with family style. You know, when you're in Italy, everything is family style. So you got family styles. Everybody's passing the pus Right, exactly, and everybody's passing the meats and the cheeses and the wine and the grub.

Speaker 1: 14:34

And it makes it nice because everybody's having a conversation. They're talking about the day you know if they did shopping M-T-Zero or whatever. They're talking about what they did and that makes you fun.

Speaker 2: 14:44

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 14:45

And then you know when you're on these tours. Even though a lot of the people on the tours don't know each other in the very beginning, they wind up knowing each other at the very end.

Speaker 2: 14:54

Oh yeah, I mean, we did so much bonding as a group. It was really, really nice.

Speaker 1: 15:01

Now, I'm sure now, after you've finished this wonderful lunch, this light lunch, and you get back on the bus, how many people were still awake?

Speaker 2: 15:11

Not many.

Speaker 1: 15:13

Not many.

Speaker 2: 15:14

So you were heading out to Lucca. Yeah, then we went to Lucca and it was thank goodness it was only a short drive, you know, I'd probably say about a half hour drive. So it wasn't too far from the farmhouse. So then we went to Lucca.

Speaker 1: 15:29

And Lucca is known for its Renaissance era.

Speaker 2: 15:30

Oh yeah, just a beautiful city. And the city walls are all Renaissance and some of the current buildings are built into the city walls, so it's really just a beautiful, beautiful city. It's very well preserved, a lot more preserved than I thought, considering how old the city actually is. It's amazing.

Speaker 1: 15:48

You know, we know all about World War I and World War II and a lot of these places in Italy and in Germany and all over have been destroyed and rebuilt, but some of these places have survived. Oh yeah, and to know that and see it is amazing. Yeah, Now, Luzer is known for their Renaissance period, apparently, and their building.

Speaker 2: 16:06

Yeah, the city actually dates so far back 56 BC. Wow, when Julius Caesar and Pompey and Crassius I think I'm saying that, right, crassius, anyway they actually formed a political alliance. They are in Lucca, so it's actually known for that. It's one of the things it's known for that I learned while we were on our tour, yeah because our tour guide, the same tour guide who met us, you know, in PSA.

Speaker 1: 16:33

she met us in Lugansk, so that was really nice, so the tour guide does not get onto the motor coach.

Speaker 2: 16:37

No, no, she just meets us there.

Speaker 1: 16:39

Now is this tour guide hired by Celtic Tours?

Speaker 2: 16:42

They are, yeah, fabulous. Yeah, we take lot of people worried that they won't understand. But and we had our little whispers. You know the little things in the ear, you know better. They call whispers so you can hear. So if you fall behind, you don't have to be right on top of her or on top of him.

Speaker 2: 17:02

There's a lot of people go when they say yeah, yeah, yeah so you didn't have to worry about that because you do have your little ear buds, so that makes it nice as well. So, again, luca was more of a walking. It was a walking tour where we went into the different piazzas and talked about the history, and I don't want to give too much information because I want people to go there and visit themselves. Well, we need a little bit, but I will tell you that is also today very, very well known for its summer festival. Every year they have this huge Luca summer festival and they have famous artists and some of the past artists have actually been like Eric Clapton, tracy Chapman and Santana Wow, and every summer that happens in Luca.

Speaker 1: 17:42

And do they have a name for it? Is it called the Luca summer? It's called the Luca summer festival, that's what it's called.

Speaker 2: 17:47

Yeah, very easy. Luca Summer Festival yeah, cool, and that's every year. Yeah, every year, yep, yep. And you just missed it. Yeah, I just no, no, we haven't missed it, we haven't missed it. Yet it's coming this summer. Well, you missed it, I missed it, I missed it, I I don't know who was performing this year, because I didn't find out about it until I was there.

Speaker 1: 18:09

Oh, but they have them there.

Speaker 2: 18:12

Where are they performing? They're in the Piazza, in the Piazza. Napoleon it's actually called the Piazza Napoleon, which is one of the main piazzas in the area it's an open air. It's very open air. Yeah, they put up the stage and that's where everybody performs. That's a fun thing. They're also believe it or not, they're also known for hosting a comic and games festival every year, which I had no idea.

Speaker 1: 18:35

Like a.

Speaker 2: 18:36

Comic-Con, like a Comic-Con, yeah, for comics and beans, and it's actually the largest in Europe. How big is this? It's quite large. It's quite large, yeah. So after our tour and everything, we all had some free time, so I decide that. You know I'm gonna wander, so I go off and wander and I'm doing some shopping and I get lost. So it's well.

Speaker 1: 18:56

I usually tell people to get lost in there, so they can experience it, but you really want to get lost.

Speaker 2: 19:02

I got lost and you know, thank goodness for maps you know, because it tells you where you need to go.

Speaker 2: 19:07

But I completely got lost and I'm following maps and I'm following maps and it's not taking me where I need to go. So I'm texting somebody hey, where are you, where are you? You know, help me. So I walked all over the city, but it was really nice because I walked all the way to the other side of the city where they had a beautiful little park with a carousel, and the carousel must be about 300 years old, oh my gosh, I mean. So I love when I do things like that, because I get lost and I explore and I'm able to come up on things that nobody else would have seen. I love when people get lost, but not really. You're not really lost, you really can't get really lost. I mean, the city is a very large city, right, but I mean, if you just contact somebody, say hey, where are you?

Speaker 1: 19:51

We'll help you get back, yeah exactly, we help you get back.

Speaker 2: 19:54

So, you wound up seeing more things. I did that wasn't even on the tour I didn't do a lot of shopping because I was worried about getting back to the medical town.

Speaker 1: 20:04

Not any shopping done there. Well, I ended up on the other day. Yes, of course I did.

Speaker 2: 20:09

I did shop at the farm and I told you I got my wine.

Speaker 1: 20:12

So you know, I got some olive oil and I got my olive oil and some cheese. Oh and cheese too.

Speaker 2: 20:16

And some cheese yeah, because you can bring back cheeses. Yes, you can't bring back meats, but you can bring back cheeses, amazing, amazing.

Speaker 1: 20:24

So now we went to Pisa. We had our light lunch, we're in Luka and now. Almost five o'clock, so now we're heading back. We are heading back to the villa, correct?

Speaker 2: 20:36

Yeah, so everybody meets at the motor coach and we all get back to the villa and for an evening on your own.

Speaker 1: 20:43

So tonight everybody's on their own if they want to stay and eat or if they want to go and wander.

Speaker 2: 20:47

Yeah, you can do whatever they want. Yeah, and a lot of people would go into town because, as I mentioned, the town is like right there, it's a couple blocks.

Speaker 1: 20:54

And there's some nice little restaurants. There's things to do in there. Yeah, I think a lot of people actually went to a little pizzeria right around the corner there. I was not hungry in any way, I was going to say was anybody hungry after that?

Speaker 2: 21:04

No, I was not hungry. I just went down to the lobby got myself a bottle of wine, right, because, as I mentioned, you can go down to the lobby and they'll open a bottle of wine for you for only seven euros, I know. I know it's a great deal. So I went and got of wine and I sat outside and just enjoyed the evening. Yeah, but I did.

Speaker 1: 21:21

That makes it nice. I like to be able to run around and see things and then I like to come back and relax. Yeah, and that's exactly what's going on with this in particular tour, because everybody's coming back to the villa and chilling yeah, and that makes it great.

Speaker 2: 21:35

Yeah. So I mean, and again, this group bonded so well that a lot of them say, hey, let's go to the pizzeria, Right?

Speaker 1: 21:41

And Regina started paying. I think 10 of them just went to the pizzeria. It's nice. Yeah, it was very, very nice. Yeah, it gets to be cozy. Yeah, you know, even though there's 20 some odd of you, it gets to be cozy.

Speaker 2: 21:52

It does. It does and not everybody. We understand that not everybody clicks or whatever, but you tend to do mingle with like people. Yes, so it's nice, and if you don't want to mingle, I had guests who just went back to the room and went back to bed.

Speaker 1: 22:05

Right, Because it was a long day for them.

Speaker 2: 22:08

So yeah, so you don't necessarily have to do that.

Speaker 1: 22:12

Now we are going to go to day four on X podcast. Yes, so what are you going to tease me with for day four?

Speaker 2: 22:19

Well, let me tell you we are going to do some cooking, Cooking.

Speaker 1: 22:25

Now, I hate to cook, but I don't mind watching people cook and I don't like eating what they cook, but I hate to cook. So cooking is going to be interesting and you're going to be doing this at the villa.

Speaker 2: 22:35

We are doing this at the villa. Very fun, very fun.

Speaker 1: 22:38

So again, diana, thank you for joining me today. Thank you Telling us all about Pisa, Luta and that little tiny lunch that you had.

Speaker 2: 22:48

Thanks so much, Z.

Speaker 1: 22:51

Well, that's it for today's episode of the Z Michelson Travel Podcast. I hope you enjoyed our journey and found some new inspiration for your next adventure. Remember, the world is full of stories and sometimes all it takes is a plane ticket to start your own adventure. If you loved today's episode, be sure to tune in every week and don't forget to share your favorite travel moments with me on social media I'd really love to hear about where you're headed to next media I'd really love to hear about where you're headed to next. So until next time, keep exploring, keep discovering and, as always, keep traveling with your heart wide open. I'm Zee Michelson and I'll see you on the next adventure.