The only thing good about Firenze is the food

---

A couple of train rides out of Cinque Terre, we arrived in Firenze… our first real Italian city. It was only up until our stay in Firenze that I had printed out Google maps from the train station to our hotels… and of course the tourist information office in the train station was closed for construction. We finally decided just to call the hotel (duh). The hotel turned out to only be a 3 minute walk from the station.
My favorite thing about Italy is the way they display their food: Gelati, pizza, calazones, fruit, pastries. Its arranged so perfectly based on color, texture, etc. And of course I’m a sucker for things that look pretty. We stopped at a place with a beautiful gelati display and journaled a little bit.
We quickly found out that Firenze can easily be done in 1 day. The rest of the time, you will be eating gelati and people watching, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But I am glad we ran into an old man named Francessco, because he made Firenze and Italian men unforgettable. He mentioned that he was no married and enjoyed being single because he “ liked having sex with women free of the complications of love.” And then proceeds to tell us about how “the only way to satisfy a women is with the tongue because the fingers are too hard.” Mary and I just kept giggling, and then excused ourselves a couple topics later. Crazy old Italian chain-smoking man.
First impressions of Firenze weren’t that great, but I think it was only that way because I know nothing about Italian history, language, or much of its culture. I didn’t like being in a place with an unfamiliar language, where I can’t even eavesdrop and pick up a few words. And it smelled really bad at random spots along the street. It was here I began to understand what Greg meant when he told us we would be smelling weird things and asking ourselves “Why?” a lot.
We climbed up the Duomo, the first dome ever constructed. The view was pretty cool because Firenze is mostly flat and then there are green hills surrounding it. I’m glad we went to the museum because it filled us in on some of the art and history of the building. There was an entire section dedicated to showing the process of the construction. It was complicated because it was the first dome and had to create new techniques and tools for the building.
We hiked up a bunch more stairs (Mary and I hate stairs now) up to Piazza Michelangelo, which is a hill that sits on the outskirts and looks over the city. We rewarded ourselves with overpriced gelati when we got to the top. View was great, took some snaps, and saw a replica of Michelangelo’s David, so we didn’t have to stand in line and pay to see the real one at Acadamia.
Both nights in Firenze, Mary and I seemed to get a little delirious around 9:30pm. The heat and fatigue just got to us I guess. We would walk around, people watching, sit on the steps of the church, try to pretend we were French. We got some drinks at a completely dead bar (but it was only 10:30 so that’s expected in Europe) and somehow got tipsy off of 2 drinks.
I’m sure Firenze would be much more interesting if I knew more about art and history, but it was a difficult transition from France. The only thing I really like about Italy is the food. I had some amazing gnocchi pesto that was worth the 12 euros.

---

Photos

gelati
eat twice daily for good health