Hill towns of Tuscany

So we are now in Florence. Chris and I had a one day whirlwind tour of Florence yesterday, seeing the city which is the birthplace of Renaissance. Such a fascinating place. We took the train from Orvieto (our town of stay for the previous 3 nights) and got into Florence at around 10am. We checked into our hotel here and went straight to the Duomo, the main church in Florence. Its dome was modeled after the Pantheon's Dome in Rome. A beautiful church on the outside.



Next, we shopped around for souvenirs for people, mainly Italian scarves-poor Chris. At one point Chris had about 6 scarves in his hands for me. I joked that I was going to take a picture of him and put it on the blog. Next, we walked across the Ponte Vecchio, a famous bridge here.

Next, we went to the Ufizzi-an art museum with some of the best Renaissance art anywhere. We spent about an hour in there, saw some beautiful art. Chris and my favorite was the Birth of Venus, by Boticello. Next, we went into St. Croce Church, a church that is under most toursits' radar here. I am not sure why because this is the place where Michaelangelo is buried. he has a wonderful tomb, intricately carved with, fittingly, some sculptures around it. This man was extraordinary. Seeing the Sistine Chapel, his Pieta in St Peters in Rome, and David (which I will talk about in a bit) I couldn't help but think this is the person in history I would have wanted to met the most. We learned a lot about him this trip, several being that he did his work himself, instead of hiring a crew of men to help him AND that he did not make plaster versions of what he wanted to sculpture to look at while doing the actual sculpturing. He worked from his own vision and came up with it as he went . . . After St. Croce, we went to see David at the Accademia. This piece of art is the single most amazing piece EVER (in my opinion!) I left me speechless and my eyes even teared up . . . even after seeing it a few years ago. Chris too thought it was absolutely amazing. The sculpture is about 14 feet tall. It is in its own room-the rooms dome above it was designed to show this art off at its best. You just circle around it in awe of how Michaelangelo could have down it. It took him 3 years and he started at the age of 26, I believe-so young. It looks so lilfe like-his ribs, his muscles, his legs. Michaelangelo studied cadavers to understand the human body. This was actually forbidden because during that time, people thought it was messing with God too much. Leaving this beautiful piece was so hard. As we were walking away I kept looking back, wanting to get another glance and another glance. Chris pretty much had a to pry me out of the place. Last night was very relaxing, just took a stroll in the city and saw the city at night.

So, Chris has become an afficionado of gelato. He loves it and we had to capture a pic of him and one of his favorite things here


This morning we are taking a train to Venice for our last leg of the trip :( We are there 3 nights and then come back.

I will have to blog about Orvieto and our hill town experiences later. We have to catch our train soon.