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Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Florence


Florence got off to a shaky start since we lost our hotel information, and could not remember the name or address of it. We searched every scrap of paper in our bags for about 1/2 hr. we looked for wireless service for Chris' laptop and nothing. Finally I remembered searching out our hotel on yahoo maps and I thought I remembered writing the name on the back of the printout map. I found it The Fenice Palace on via de Martelli and we were saved. We took a 5 min. cab ride to the hotel. The first pic is the view of the Duomo just down the street from our hotel. The second is a closeup. It has amazing marble work on the exterior so many different colors. The next morning we headed out for the Galleria de Academia where Michaelangelo's David is kept. What an experience. To see things that you read about and see pictures of are so humbling to see in front of you. The level of work that
it would take to achieve something like that is amazing let alone the talent to pull it off in such a remarkable way. We weren't supposed to take pics there either, but I snuck one in.







We followed a walking tour through some other sites, but one of my favorites was the Museo Nazionale del Bargello. The museum was absoloutley amazing. It was mostly sculpture, but it was an incredible collection, it had Danti, Donatello (his David), Michaelangelo, Giambologna, and a few other lesser known sculptors. As an artist these works quickly make you feel very small, and insignificant. I can hardly express how amazing it is to see these masterpieces. To walk around them and really get a sense of their genius, it is inspiring. From there we went to the Santa Croce where Michaelangelo (below on the left) is buried along with Galileo, and many other influential people. They had incredible tombs right in the main chapel with spectacular sculptures around them to pay tribute to their life. We had to go to Vivoli’s for gelato, it really is the best is Florence. I had a green apple and hazelnut flavor (different in the same cup) strange but delicious. Chris had an incredibly rich Chocolate Mousse gelato I think we had gelato at least twice a day every day in Italy.






After Santa Croce we went to the Piazza della Signoria. This is where the Michaelangelo's "David" was originally and they have a replica there. The original“Rape of the Sabine Women” is in Vecchio on the side of the Piazza along with many other famous statues.














But then our trip went a little sour. We decided to head back to the hotel to meet up with the couple we came with and got pretty lost. It is easy to become disoriented on the winding streets and the tourist maps are not exactly complete. We mistook the placement of our hotel next to a few landmarks, and after searching for about an hour we finally found the restaurant where we ate the night before and could make our way from there. It was a bit stressful, and Chris was getting tired of my “checking down this street or that street” from the Duomo and talked to Alex our waiter from the night before who knew our hotel. Italy has the greatest people, and he saved us. We have meet the friendliest most helpful people, so genuine. We were thrilled to finally find our hotel room and relax. Getting lost was stressful and we were hesisitant to go out to dinner to a restaurant over the Ponte Vecchio that Dave and Jody had been referred to. But we went anyway. It turned out to be a great place, the owner treated us great and it was delicious. I had Strazzeleta or something like that. It was pretty much a ricotta and spinach dumpling covered in a butter sauce. Then we had some assorted bruschetta for an appetizer. The walk back was just magical. It had begun to get dark and the lights were coming up across the Ponte Vecchio (Florence’s most famous bridge). There we listened to street performers and saw couples holding hands, everything felt so romantic. We quickly forgot our previous experience and were able to relax again. We went back to the Piazza Della Signoria when we heard another street performer singing “With or Without You.” Of course we had to check it out as any good U2 fan would do and it was great, they were amazing performers. On the way back we could see something going on down a side street and we saw a great little chapel with an Orchestra playing, so we stopped and peeked inside the door for a few minutes. Then we decided we had better head over to the Reginnella for dessert to see Alex and thank him for saving us earlier that day, and then headed back to the hotel exhausted. A very long but memorable day.

The next day we decided to hit the Uffizi first thing in the morning. We didn’t have to wait in line for long, but we discovered the Rembrandt room was closed so that was a bit of a disappointment. Although you could peek your head in from another room and still see most of the collection. It was exciting to see many paintings I have only seen in books and my favorite Botticelli. We then went to the Pitti Palace to see the Boboli Garden. It was incredible the statues and the layout was amazing. Little buildings, towers, and fountains everywhere. On the end they were setting up seating and a stage for a huge concert. It was so nice to get off the crazy streets full of people and relax a little in the gardens alone. There were the neatest tunnels made out of tree branches that spanned a huge portion of the gardens. The garden was at least a mile long and half as wide.













We ate lunch and then headed over to the Duomo. We climbed to the top (literally at least 15 stories high and over 400 steps in a tiny little winding staircase) we were winded but we needed it after all the gelato we have been eating. The view on top was unbelievable. You could see every site in the city we had visited in the past two days it was the perfect last stop of our day.
We went in for dinner and they had saved us a table and our cake. Our waiter Alex is such a funny guy. He is from Albania, but lives in Italy, and lived in America for a few years as well in New York. He had a great Brooklyn accent, and would goof around like crazy mostly trying to get a date for the night, or teasing people as they walked by. We all hit it off pretty well the first night we came in to Florence and when we got lost he helped us get our bearings. We promised to go back that night for dessert and then after dessert last night we promised we would go back for dinner tonight (our last night in Florence.) Well we all got a bit silly and started taking pictures. Alex had been heckling the owner of the restaurant next door so he had come over a few times, and while we were taking pictures of the waiters we had become friends with and the owner of the Reginella, the other owner came and got in on the picture too. Well then he came back with a trick camera which squirted water and got the owner of the Reginella. So he got a bucket of water and they kept trying to get the other guy to come back over. Then the other guy started dressing up in goofy wigs and coming over to tease them, and brought a horned hat for the owner of the Reginella. Meanwhile we are snapping pictures of all this, then the other owner grabbed the camera and started taking pictures of the waiters, us, girls off the street, other customers, his crotch. It was pretty funny, we were just rolling. I can’t believe how many friends we have made on this trip. The people of Italy are just awesome.





1 comments:

Janalee Hubbard said...

Where's the crazy pics of the restaurant? Sounds like a lot of fun! Have you read Eat, Pray, Love? If not, you would enjoy it! The way you describe the people of Florence and the gelato reminds me of Elizabeth Gilbert's experience in Rome. It makes me want to go there for the food!! You took some great pictures with that camera! Thanks for letting me visit these places vicariously! It's so incredible.