Urbanus Magnus

Mechanical watches aren't yet relegated to the sidelines completely; there are still numerous companies manufacturing thrifty automatic watches in the $80-150 range. Possibly the best example of such a watch is my current timepiece, one from venerable the Seiko '5' line of watches. Unlike their quartz cousins, though mechanicals won't need batteries (and often don't need maintenance for over a decade), they do need adjustment to keep accurate time. My Seiko, which came from the factory about 5 s/day fast, has settled into a consistent 30s/day slow. Not wanting to pay a watchmaker $30 to do something I am capable of, I set about to adjust the mechanism.  Seiko 5 Auto-winding watch - pretty bulletproof, and looks decent to boot Here's what you'll need: A mechanical watch A computer with Audacity or equivalent sound-recording program A microphone A quiet room A set of micro screw drivers/bits A magnifying glass (optional) A watch case opener ...

In Italy, we hope to cut our costs down somewhat by cooking as many of our meals as possible. But, the availability of stove fuels is somewhat different that North America, meaning that choosing a stove is a little hard. White gas (camping fuel), and the standard EN417-threaded butane canisters so plentiful here are quite scant in most of Europe - Italy included. Across the pond, Campingaz' dominance in the market means that its own proprietary canisters are ubiquitous throughout much of the continent, to the chagrin of many tourists, who won't have much luck finding EN417 butane canisters for their stoves in all but the largest cities in Italy.* *Update: We have completed our tour of Italy, and in fact did not have too much difficulty locating the EN417-threaded canisters.  We purchased our refill at an odd little "Liquigas" shop in Siena, a chain which appears to be unique to Italy. There are more of these shops, and so our advice would be to start the search the...

*Watch for updates on  this page . The Italian cycling trip has changed quite significantly in the second rendition. Now, we will be avoiding the western oceanfront and heading through the heartland of Italy: Central Tuscany. The stops include  Firenze (Florence), where we'll be flying in, followed by cycling through the great Italian hill towns of San Gimignano,  Volterra, Siena, Montalcino, Montepulciano, Orvieto and Viterbo. From Viterbo, the rest of the inter-city transit will be done by train; we head to Rome through the Ferrovie Regionale (regional railway), then Pompei and Napoli (Naples). Some Sights: Pozzo di S. Patrizio - St. Patrick's Well Orvieto Underground Piazza della Cisterna Roman Theatre Of Volterra Rick Steves on Tuscan Hill Towns Map View Cycling Italy in a larger map Itinerary May:      31. Depart from Toronto, Flight to Firenze (Florence) June Arrive Firenze --> A few sights, then sleep ...

It looks as if the entire itinerary  of the Italy Trip may be changed. I'm one who loves the countryside, but a trip with few sights won't be that exciting. The cycling portion of the trip I had planned skirts the seaside of Tuscany and a bit of Lazio, hitting the small towns and countryside. No big sights to see, aside from San Gimignano, and Pisa, in the first 150km of the trip. It would have been primarily about enjoying the Italian countryside - which is admittedly far more beautiful, hilly and varied than most of Southern Ontario. My fears of less-than-optimal trip planning were confirmed when I pulled some Rick Steves guidebooks off the shelves of my local library. I was expecting the small towns to at least have a few sights, but apart from 2 or 3 Etruscan tomb museums, there aren`t too many impressive sights to see. I'm sad at learning that my many hours of meticulous kilometer-by-kilometer trip planning hadn't taken into account the other sights of Tuscany;...