Yes, it's leaning

We finally made it over to Pisa this morning to see its famous bell tower.  Pisa is a university town with lots of students and other sites to see.  However, throngs of tourists come by the busload to Campo dei Miracoli (Field of Miracles) to see the Duomo, Baptistry, and the Bell Tower -- the infamous Leaning Tower of Pisa.  I'd like to say we were different and truly explored Pisa and all it has to offer, but we weren't.  We at least toured on our own and were not a part of the thousands of bus tour groups that descended upon the area.

We did tour the Duomo but made no attempt to climb the tower.  Did I mention the throngs of people?  The Tower currently leans at a five degree angle (15 feet off the vertical axis).  When it was built, there was not sufficient foundation for the marshy soil and it began to lean almost from the beginning.  Back in the 1990s, the tower was closed for about a decade as engineers tried to stabilize its lean.  Actually, all of the buildings in the Field of Miracles lean to a certain degree, but because the Bell Tower's lean is so dramatic, everything else seems perfectly straight.