Word: pisa
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...almost a million visitors clambered up the 294 steps and peered out over its vertiginous tilt--about 13 ft. off plumb and growing by an alarming .04 in. to .08 in. a year. Pisa's historic Leaning Tower, experts warned, had leaned too far and could topple at any time in the next decade or two. So the 800-year-old white marble structure, one of Italy's most famous monuments, was closed for nearly 12 years and for $25 million of ingenious engineering work to set it a little straighter. Not, of course, entirely straight--Dio mio!--that would...
Over last weekend, timed to the Feast of San Ranieri, Pisa's patron saint, the plaza beneath the tower was reopened to the public. The tower itself will be reopened in the fall--but only to 30 visitors at a time, accompanied by a guide. And no leaning...
...with Genoa--and Pisa's defeat in 1284--suspends building for nearly a century...
Sources: Coordination Committee for the Safeguard of the Tower of Pisa; University of Pisa; CS Informatica, Pisa: Eyewitness Guide to Italy; Associated Press
...seemed almost too good to be true, an opportunity to escape London's dreary non-summer and fly to Pisa for a weekend for an improbable $7, excluding airport taxes and a handling fee. Seeing the offer on the website for Ryanair, the no-frills Irish airline, I immediately tapped in a couple of convenient dates, credit card at the ready. But excitement soon turned to disappointment as I realized that not only were all the promotional offers gone, so were the seats in the next price bracket ... and the next ... and the next. The cheapest seat I could find...