May 22, 2004.  Well, made it all the way to big #4--and hey, where better to celebrate the anniversary of silk and appliances than Italy, right?   So I packed a nice tie and a european power adaptor and off we went.  We hadn't planned on anything this fancy but my dad's invite to hang out at his rented tuscan villa for a few days was a bit much to turn down.  So we started there--a very beautiful and molto isolated place owned by some nice Brits, Chris and Patricia. 

We arrived on the 22nd and took a train from Rome up to Livorno (near Pisa).  Dad kindly picked us up and took us to the villa--just outside the small hill town of Volterra. Most of these pics are from the villa--the view from the back terrace was stunning.  We drank a lot of wine and ate a lot of cheese and salami, of course because that's what we do on vacation.  We learned about sfuso--bulk vino that wineries take right off the top with no post production aging.  Chris, the owner of the villa told us about it and gave us a bottle of his private stash that he stored under the villa in an ancient Estruscan tomb (seriously).  It was quite good and is VERY cheap.  In the last couple pics you see what we picked up at a local market.  Filled up that crazy bottle for about $5.  Was worth the price just to see him fill up our jug with a gas hose :)