Thursday market in Brindisi, Cappuccino,the caves

                                             Entering the cave

                                                    looking out of the cave

                                                 Watching the womens world cup

                                               pottery from Grottaglie

                                                 Booba Beach

While still in California,but following the Brindisi happenings on facebook, I heard alot about the weekly Thursday market.We(the girls and I) were super excited to go because we heard the shopping was awesome. Jamie came to our apartment because she was going to drive us in Daniel's rental car. Did I mention Daniel was in Israel for a week ? We got there around 9:30 and shopped till around 12:30ish. Shopping was great,think swap meet but cheaper prices. Italian sandles for as little as $7 a pair, real leather and very cute. A well meaning shoe vendor saw me and nicely directed me to the "grande" section. I guess 9 1/2 is grande in Italy :)lol I was overwhelmed by it all and came home with a cactus:) Sarah bought 3 pairs of shoes, bracelet, and necklace. Johanna didn't end up going because she had a stomach ache, but we brought home 3 dresses for her :) Note to self,check the weather forecast and don't go on a day its going to reach 99 degrees :0 The next day I had an appointment for a tour of the downtown area, that got rescheduled that morning, but why waste a morning where I'm already up and ready??? Cappuccino time!!! Met Jaime at the Cafe and got our 1 euro cappuccino :) Basically thats $1.30 a cup. Now the only thing I ever ordered from Starbucks was the Chai Tea Soy latte because their coffee is too bitter for me. Of course Johanna and Sarah drank everything Starbucks had to offer, and when they both agreed that that was the best cappuccino they have ever tasted, I took their word for it, and for only 1 euro!!!! There are a lot of these "coffee bars" around and they are busy. Basically, you order, get served, drink quickly while standing at the bar, pay, and off you go. Of course there is also expresso but I will have to work my way up to drinking that. At this particular cafe there are tables outside so you can enjoy a leisure cup if you have time. On Saturday we headed out for The Grottoes of Castellana, to take a look at the underground caves found it that area. By the time we found the place we had missed the tour in English, so ended up taking the 2 hour tour in Italian. According to Daniel,our translator lol, a lot of information on stalagmites and stalagtites, and what shapes they kind of look like :) Being in Italy, you had formations that represented the Virgin Mary, three wise men and I think there was Jesus's face :) It was a fun,cool trip and got us out of the heat. Of course while we were waiting for our tour we did some damage in the stores. The kids picked up some mounted insects,we got various olive oils, and I got some regional pottery and amber earrings.It was a great day :)