Picture of the Day, Pisa

Pisa, Italy -- August, 2011

I've said it before -- Pisa was serenely beautiful in the mornings. I visited the leaning tower every day I was there, and I just loved to enjoy it in the quiet morning light. The sunlight was especially beautiful this morning. What I also really like about this view of the tower is that you can see the top of the tower was built in a way to 'correct' for the base's leaning. The tower was built in three stages, and during the second stage, the floors were built taller on one side to straighten it out a bit...in appearance, at least. Another interesting note is that much effort has gone into preventing further tilting (or toppling) while retaining the original tilt. The reasons for the former are pretty obvious -- no one wants the tower to fall over. They want to retain the tilt because of its historical significance (and because no tourists want to go see the no-longer-leaning tower of Pisa).