Florence, Italy

Day 6-7/20

We took a high speed train into Firenze Santa Maria Novella train station. Then we spent about an HOUR trying to find a bus route map and then the actual bus to take us to our hotel.

But that was just the beginning!  We took the bus, got off at the stop that was listed, but then had no idea where to go!  We walked in circles, dragging our luggage, in the hot sun for about an hour, stopping to ask 3-4 people.  No one had heard of our hotel and weren't much help.  One girl used her phone to pull up Google Maps, but it turned out to be the wrong location (or we weren't reading it right!)  Another lady spoke only Italian but seemed to know where to go.  She pointed for us to go across the bridge (ponte), but from there we weren't sure.  We started walking around La Fortezza (fort), thinking it might be somehow inside the walls (the name of our hotel WAS La Fortezza, afterall!), but a man speaking English noticed we looked lost.  He didn't know where it was, but told us it definitely WASN'T inside the Fortezza.  We FINALLY found it (somewhat by luck), about 2 blocks from where we started!

We checked in, but our room wasn't ready yet, so we had to leave our luggage in a big pile.  We had a destination, and the front desk clerk told us it was a 15 min walk.  He even drew out a path on the map, so we were feeling pretty good.  It turned into an hour though!  We had to grab some quick paninis to eat on the run. Apparently, in Florence, it is customary to spread out paintings on the sidewalk to sell.  Well, they are right in the middle of where people are walking!  Joe didn't notice them and stepped right on some, causing the seller to start yelling at him!  Oops:)

 Then I realized that in all the frustration of the morning and having to ditch our luggage without re-arranging things, I didn't have the tickets or the reservation# for the Uffizi Gallery (which we were already late for our booking time!)  We had to resort to turning on the 3G and looking it up by email, praying it wouldn't cost TOO MUCH!  It was no problem that we were a little late, but once again, the Italians proved not to be very good at directions.  One guy at the museum told us to go to door 3 and pointed down and to the other side of the museum...it turned out to be right across the street (which we found AFTER walking around for 15 min!)  Anyways, we were not impressed at all with the Uffizi, one of the "top" galleries in all of Florence.  No pictures were allowed, but we didn't miss much.  We rented an audio guide, but it turned out to be a big waste of money.  It just gave more information about each # of artwork that you pushed.  I would have liked a suggested "tour."  We did get some good views from inside the Uffizi, though.

Afterward, we just wandered around Florence a bit.  We saw the Palazzo Vecchio, then wandered across the famous Ponte Vecchio and sat outside the Pitti Palace for a bit.

 Palazzo Vecchio

View of Ponte Vecchio (bridge)

 view from Ponte Vecchio

My legs had a MAJOR rash that had started the day before.  It was BURNING and itching really badly by now.  I wasn't sure if it was heat rash, sunburn or something else, but it was bothering me A LOT.  So I tried to see a doctor.  But they were already closed for the day.  I called the 24 hour service to see if I could schedule an appt (that's what it said on the door), but it would have been 140 Euros for a doctor to come to our hotel!  I decided to wait it out (problem being that it was already Saturday, and no one would be available until Monday.)

Day 7-7/21

We made our 8:30 entrance time to the Galleria Academia, which, though much smaller, we enjoyed far better than the Uffizi.  We listened to a Rick Steves guided tour, which was very helpful.  Of course, we saw "David," the Academia's claim to fame.  It was really big and pretty cool, but to me not as impressive as all the hype.  It seemed very disproportioned.  There were several other cool statues, including some that were unfinished and looked rather odd, but we were out in about an hour (no pics).

We decided to go to the Galileo Science Museum and I thought it was VERY interesting!  It had all kinds of old equipment (math, science, astronomy, medical, etc).  A few highlights were an optical illusion painting, 3 fingers of Galileo's right hand, obstetrical models for a forceps delivery, and a neat hands-on area at the end.  There was a fun trajectory demonstration for a cannon.  [our camera battery died at this point!]

 an old calculating machine

 astronomical telescopes

 Cool optical illusion painting (had louvers and when you looked down on them (in the mirror), the image changed!

 me and my buddy, Galileo Gallilei

his thumb and 2 fingers....weird, I know!

 apothecary's medicines, still intact

 obstetrical models

We spent the day wandering with no particular place to go (since we were so stressed from all the "scheduled" sights in Rome), but we got bored of that pretty quickly. It's not all that great to sit an people watch when all you're watching is other tourists:)

We did decide that many locals ride their bikes around Florence:)

We found a wonderful restaurant that had FANTASTIC homemade tagliere pasta with pesto.  The owner/server was really friendly.  On the way back,we ran into the Piazza della Signora/Loggia dei Lenzi, an outdoor sculpture gallery up on a kind of "stage."  We saw a copy of the Rape of Sabine Woman, which we had been unable to see in the Uffizi.  We also saw a statue of Perseus, holding the head of Medusa, which we knew Juliana would like (Joe told her stories with Medusa as the "rival."

 David replica

 Perseus and Medusa

After that, we went back to the hotel for a little bit to rest our feet.  We called the kids on Facetime at Aunt Julie's.  It was so good to see them, but Connor got sad and wanted to "climb in there" to get to Italy! (aww, buddy:(   We later heard that he was fine once he got distracted by going to the park, but Juliana was missing us later that day and carried around a picture of us that she found at Grandma's.

We did some laundry in the sink and then had a bear of a time trying to blow up the "easily inflatable" hangars we had brought with us!  It ended up being pretty funny.

Then we went back out for dinner.  We wandered around to try to find a quiet place more off the beaten path, hoping for some great food, but the food was only ok, and we didn't get the ambiance we really wanted.  There was only one other Italian guy there, who seemed friends with the owner/server.  It was also really hard to sleep that night because we had some LOUD people near our room.

Day 8- July 22

Today we headed to the Duomo (cathedral) and  surrounding buildings.  First, we climbed up the steps of the dome.  It was 450 steps up!!!!  It was pretty crowded inside, and the traffic flow was not helping.  At some points, we had to squeeze against the wall to let people come down.  There was a German lady behind me who kept pushing me and yelling at me to GO!  Move!!  I think she was having claustophobia issues, but I couldn't go anywhere!  It was pretty funny. 

 view of the dome from half-way up

 Our legs hurt, but we made it!

 view of the campanielle (bell tower)

  (there's the crazy lady, in the background!)

We got back down just in time for a free English tour of the cathedral.  Our tour guide was really good and it was nice to hear a lot of the little background stories.  Bruelleschi had the idea of how to build the dome, but he wouldn't tell anyone.  He just said it was like an egg.  He wanted to be the one to do it!  The design of the dome is actually an octagon, with each side showing images of the 7 days of creation and then the end of the world.  The rest of the ceiling is also designed in the theme of the end of time as well.  There is one painting of God holding out his hand and pushing away a sword, as if saying "there is no need to judge now."  Below him, are 3 women, Faith, Hope, Charity. Charity=Love and is in the center since the greatest of these is Love!  (sound like 1st Corinthians?) There is a painting of Dante with 3 sections: inferno (hell), purgatory and heaven.  It's Judgement Day inside the Duomo!  The church's doors are called the Gates of Paradise (the originals are kept in the museum) and depict the story of the world in each panel: Adam & Eve, Noah & his family, Easu & Jacob, Moses & the Law, David & Goliath, Cain & Abel, Abraham, Joseph & his brothers, Joshua & his entry to the Promised Land, Solomon & the Queen of Sheba.  (I think I need to brush up on some of my Bible stories!) Underneath the cathedral was a crypt of  a 5th century church, but there wasn't much to see there.  The outside of the Duomo was really colorful, and had quite a different look to it!

 this is what you had to wear if you didn't think ahead and bring something to cover your shoulders/knees:) While it's very stylish, I'm glad I had read ahead about these things!

 The picture is bad, but this is the Dante painting

 Bruenelleschi's octagonal dome

 5th century crypt below church-not much to look at, but just amazing that things still exist that are so old!

Then we headed into the baptistery. It was pretty much just another dome to look at, and while pretty, we only stayed about 3 minutes. It did have nice mosaic ceilings, however.

The baptistery

 mosaic ceilings

The museum was sort of a joke, as most of it was closed.  We got a closer look at the Gates of Paradise, saw a late Michaelangelo Pieta, which was very different from his 1st one that we saw in Rome.  There was also a statue of a man and woman that we thought was funny as if he was asking for a little romance and she was saying no:)

The museum

 "want to roll in the hay?  It'll just take 5 min."  "no, no, stop bothering me."

 a late Michaelangelo Pieta

 In the afternoon, we headed over to the Santa Croce Church.  Unfortunately, the main alter was under scaffolding, so we couldn't get a good look, but there were some pretty frescoes on the ceilings.  This church is the final resting place for many famous Italians, including: Machiavelli, Dante, Michaelangelo and Gallileo.  In the courtyard, there were some statues, which we had fun naming and coming up with their stories:) 

 we named this one "guy hailing a cab"

 Michaelangelo's tomb

We had it in our head to walk across the river to this really great viewpoint in Michaelangelo's Piazelle.  But it turns out it was ALL uphill and it was sweltering hot!  We eventually made it, but spent about 2 minutes admiring the piazza and then tried to find some shade and somewhere to sit!  We just relaxed here for about an hour before making our way back down.  We decided to go back to the same restaurant from lunch yesterday since we liked it so much!

 we made it across the river...

 now up, up, up...

 view from the piazelle

 

 Michaelangelo's David (replica)

 

just resting

 back across Ponte Vecchio (admiring all the jewelry!) to find our fave restaurant

Overall, we liked Florence much better than Rome and much better than we thought we would!  It was a lot smaller, much easier to get around, the people were friendlier, and we got more of an Italian feel: bells ringing, people on bicycles, and lots and lots of smoking!  We would certainly go back!