Florence

Good evening from Florence. Tonight is our last night here, and we hope to continue what has been an excellent few days of eating very well at dinner tonight. Much like Venice, Florence is teeming with tourists. We heard as much French as anything while we were in Venice, and here, we hear more English than Italian. It makes it easy on us as Americans, but I worry that we should have been working harder on our Italian in preparation for our day and a half in Manarola in the Cinque Terre.

Quick summary of our time here:

We arrived on Monday, around noon. We were greeted with busy crowded alleys similar to those in Venice, with the added bonus of cars and motor bikes zooming past. Not ideal when wheeling my carry-on in tow. Score one for Stephanie and her brand new backpack. When we arrived at our hotel, a friendly lady at the desk directed us to the Mercato Centrale for lunch. The market is really cool and is what you would expect form a market - butchers, fruit, cheese etc. On the second level (what you Americans call the second floor, but us Euros refer to as the first floor), there is basically the best food court ever. Little restaurants offer meals made from fresh ingredients like those in the market below.

We enjoyed it so much that we went back today.

Stephanie's Notes: The tagliatelli was AMAZING

After lunch we visited the Galileo Science museum, which wasn't that much about Galileo, but had some really cool old globes, telescopes, and machines.

Tuesday we went on a walking tour of the historical center city of Florence. Historical indeed. Too much history to remember, but we enjoyed it and got a much better feel for the history and the current layout of the city. After that, we found the best restaurant ever. Not really a restaurant, to be accurate, but more of a dingy little bar in a very old building on the south bank of the Arno river that felt more like a little cave than a dining room.  We sat at the bar, conversed in our broken Italian and the lone server's broken English about the food, then watched the show as he gave us delicious sausages, cheeses, tomato bread soup and more meat and cheeses. It was fantastic. I don't know what it was called, everyone should go there.

Sam approves

After that, we spent the afternoon basking in the sun in the Bobili Gardens, which served as the backyard of the Pitti Palace. If Stephanie thought Peggy Guggenheim's palace in Venice was a nice house, I think the Bobili gardens are a good lawn.

We saw a gatto!!

It was a beautiful setting and a beautiful fall afternoon. The capstone of a wonderful day was an evening spent learning to cook Pizza & Gelato. We started with a pile of flour, and in three hours, we had made and devoured a delicious Tuscan Pizza. Mine was better than Stephanie's, but we both earned our diplomas. Come over to the condo some time and we will try to recreate it.

Today, our last day in Florence, has been rainy. We beat the rain mainly by hanging out inside at Museums. Luckily Florence has some decent art. You may have heard of Michalangelo's David(?) We saw him this morning. He is doing well. Then we went to the Uffizi Gallery, which has some of the most famous renaissance art in the world. Even though we are both more modern in our art preferences, we enjoyed seeing so many masterpieces. After our second lunch at the awesome market food court, we indulged in some local shopping, with Stephanie finding a nice pair of leather boots, and me adding to my RickSteves-Euro-Layer-Chic travel wardrobe with a nice wool sweater. Tomorrow we're off to the Cinque Terre, then on to Paris. For now, off to hunt another great Florentine meal.

Arrivederci,

Sam