Day 11 - Friday 22nd September - Perugia

Had a slow start to the day, relaxing breakfast, did a load of washing and then headed out. We went to the Tourist Info Centre and got some information about the tourist bus and the mini-metro. Then we headed down to Piazza Italia to book our tourist bus tickets. It's not a hop-on-hop-off because the place is too small so it takes you on a 1 hour tour of this very picturesque, very hilly town. The earliest tour with seats was at 3.15pm so we booked and also bought a 10 trip card for the mini-metro. We found our way to the mini-metro stop, caught the lift down a couple of levels to the station and hopped on a tiny little driverless carriage. It was fabulous! It goes from the old town at the top of the hill to the bottom of the hill where the modern part of town is. We rode it right to the end of the line, got off, and went around and got on for a return ride. We got off at the stop for the railway station so that we could buy our tickets to Rome on Monday and to check train times for Assisi for Saturday. We also found a big supermarket across the road where we got a few more things, plus a shopping bag I'd seen someone carrying in Venice which says on the front 'Ma Prima Caffè' (but first, coffee). Walked back to the mini, hopped back on one of the tiny little metro carriages that seem to run every few minutes and made our way back to Piazza Italia for the tourist bus. Even these are tiny compared to the usual double-decker buses we've gotten used to using. It seated about 20 and off we went bumping along the cobbled streets of this beautiful walked city.   We went through several 'porte', gateways into and out of the town through the walls. Our home is near Porta del Sole. Windy streets, gorgeous old buildings, lots of history, lovely parks, crazy drivers, crazy hairpin corners, spectacular countryside and hill views - what a thoroughly enjoyable tour we had. Our driver had said to ask him to stop if we wanted to take photos so we would stop when requested in the middle of the road and no-one tooted, they all just waited patiently. After our tour we decided to go to Punta di Vista, the bar we'd seen yesterday with the spectacular view, to have a Franciacorta (italian champagne apparently) to celebrate John getting his part-pension back after many months of waiting for the wheels of the beurocracy to grind. A lovely sunny evening and a perfect spot to take in such a beautiful view. We wandered back to our apartment looking at the restaurant menus and shops. Watched L'Eredità and then went to dinner at a restaurant that had veal cheek on the menu which we both had but it was a bit disappointing. Early night because we were heading to Assisi the next day.