Lucca, Virgo, Pisa, Florence - Meeting the SteemSTEM members, sightseeing, eating, and learning awesome new things. How could I possibly compress all that into a single post?

My attempt to post from the Utopian Hackathon in Lucca was a bit of a mess, so instead of trying to write the story, I decided to make this more of a photo-gallery post, with comments about each image.

A bit more hackathon...

The Utopian hackathon on Lucca on the 20th was a bit of a weird day for me. Not being a coder, and failing to find coders to join my team, I ended up sleeping half the day. I did catch a few shots of the guys hard at work at different points throughout the day.

One of the guys brought some really cool stickers for phones and laptops. Yes, my phone is now Utopian branded.

Coding and chatting at the table.

Coding on the couch.

House rules!

Off to Virgo

The view on the way to the Virgo observatory was just inspiring.

The SteemSTEM and Utopian teams meet at last! Well, at least those who made it in time and didn't get stuck in traffic. There was actual running and hugging, like in the movies. True story.

Lasers!!!

The lecture, tour and Q&A we got at the VIRGO observatory were without a doubt one of the most interesting experiences of my life. As a fan of science fiction, watching science prove theories and make discoveries is just awesome. I even understood most of it!

I recommend you read the posts by the @steemstem scientists (@lemouth , @suesa and other people who are smarter than I) to understand what we saw and learned.

Learning!

Long long tunnels full of nothing and lasers.

It turns!

Once again - strong recommendation to read the actual scientific summaries of the visit.

Let's Tour Pisa (or Sit)

After having lunch with the scientists at Virgo, we made our way to Pisa. It was insanely hot, so all we wanted was shade and water. Instead, we went to check that the tower indeed crooked. I am going to blame the heat for the fact that no physicist and open source developer made suggestions on how to fix it quickly before we head off to dinner.

Yup, it's crooked. And surrounded with leaning tourists with one hand in the air.

But not me. I was forbidden.

In search of shade and water.

Ice cream!!! And coffee!! Screw museum and history tours, we'll just sit right here.

Rested well? Dinner time!

A Touch of Florence

Did I mention it was hot? It was hot. The only times my brain worked was when under something that cooled it like an air conditioner or fan. @elear was just as pleased with the weather, so we skipped the museum tour to cool off.

Too hot to breathe, but we're still smiling.

Summary

As always, I am displeased with how this post came out. There were so many small memes, and jokes, and smiles and moments that I didn't document. I am looking forward to the rest of the summary posts from the guys on both teams, that will hopefully be better at telling all the stories. And videos. I was promised videos.

P.S. Happy Hardfork Day! May we all survive it with blockchain intact.

hesamali