Sadly, we bade farewell to Toscana this morning and headed east toward Venezia. On the way we stopped off at Verona.

In the centre of town is a statue dedicated to the great Italian writer of the late 1200's / early 1300's Dante Alighieri. Alas, the bird life is treating him with rather less respect than Italian literature students may, to the apparent amusement of the Girolamo Fracastoro (scientist, physician, poet, scholar of the early 1500's) in the background.

Legend has it that the stone in Girolamo's right hand will fall on the first honourable person who passes under it. Obviously our state politicians are safe. Hmm. So are our federal ones.