Carrara's claim to fame is the marble in them thar hills. Well, really the fact that the hills are made of marble (that's not snow in the photo below). In the marble museum we learned that Michelangelo came to personally chose the block to use for his most famous of sculptures: David. (However, when we saw the David in Firenze, that was disputed.)

This is very rugged country and the museum was very informative on not only the techniques used through the years of quarrying (black powder was used for while but was "not always controllable") and cutting the stone, but also moving it down the mountain. A challenge through the years for multi-ton slabs. Seeing the sheer volume of marble available, it was a bit less surprising to see how much it is used throughout Tuscany (and really the world).

Carrara also hosted an Internet cafe; there seemed fewer of these in Tuscany than in Oaxaca -- perhaps the higher standard of living means more folks have their own PC and Internet connection. But there also seemed to be fewer than in New Zealand, where I would guess the standard of living was comparable. Maybe Tuscany attracts travelers less interested in email than either Oaxaca or New Zealand?