Day Four (Tuesday)

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On our previous stay at the Hotel Palazzo Vecchio we were given a beautiful room on the ground floor. I remember the air conditioner being almost too cold. This year with me being in a single room and having a gigantic suitcase I of course had a room three flights up. Worst of all, it had no a/c. Well, it had a unit but it basically just blew in the stinkin' hot outside air. There's not much I can find to complain about in Europe, but the lack of air conditioning really irks me. Everytime we go to Europe everyone claims that they are suddenly breaking all-time temperature records. And this has been the case for the past 5-6 years. As soon as we show up the temperatures rise. And there is virtually no escape from the heat.

Needless to say, I didn't get a great night's sleep despite sleeping on top of the bed in just my undies. I guess the a/c must have done something though because when I woke up in the morning and opened the bathroom door it was like a blast furnace in there.

Breakfast at the Palazzo Vecchio is a little better than the previous hotel. At least there were some rolls and melted butter packets. No meat or cheese. The orange juice was no better either.

Our first order of business on this morning was to take our city tour of Florence with a local guide. Salvatore was getting the morning off. Most of downtown Florence bans buses so we were going to have to get around on foot.

In the Plaza della Signoria we met with our local tour guide. We were all given little radios and headsets so that we could hear the guide as he narrated his way through town.

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Photos

We started off just below David
Tyler has his Camelback water delivery system strapped on his back and I had my misting bottle with fan in a vain effort to beat the Florence heat. It wasn't even 10:00 yet and the temperature was already in the 90's. (Take a last look at my Ron Jon hat because it blew off my head somewhere out in the Aegean)

Next, the Uffizi Gallery
It was only a short walk to the entrance of the Uffizi Gallery. It houses works of art from all of Florence's noted artists. We didn't go in because of time limitations but a couple people in our group did go in during our free time after the tour.

Why didn't they name a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle after this guy?
All along the front of the Uffizi are statues of Florence's famous including Donatello, Michelangelo, and Leonardo (DiVinci). But it seemed everywhere we went there was a building designed by Giotto, a fresco painted by Giotto,or a Giotto statue. Surely he deserved to have a Turtle named after him.

Returning to the Ponte Vecchio
This is a rather splendid photo if I may say so myself.

The best way to get around in Italian towns
You didn't see them too much outside the metropolitan areas but in cities like Florence and Rome motorcycles and mopeds were everywhere. Women in dresses and guys in suits were darting in and out of traffic on these things. With gas at nearly $8.00 a gallon and traffic so congested they seem to make sense.

Florence's finest guard the Ponte Vecchio
Italian cops have some rather unusual attire. They are usually quite well-dressed. In some cities their uniforms are designed by top Italian designers. Anywhere you go they look crisp and clean. But those helmets look like something out of "Spaceballs". Maybe there's a mini-air conditioning unit housed inside all that plastic

A return to the Duomo
Our guide led us through cobbled streets and alleys past tall Medieval buildings. I was a little surprised that there were five story buildings being erected at that time.
Before long we came to the front of the Duomo. Lines of tourists were already forming to get inside.

The entrance to the cathedral
I was very impressed with the inticate artwork adorning the Duomo and Baptistry. It took nearly 6 centuries to complete the building so I assume the artwork was done by a myriad of different artists. Cambio is given credit for first incorporating the green marble in with the Carrera marble.

The Gates of Paradise on the Baptistry
As Master Builder of Florence my buddy Giotto commissioned many of the big names in art to decorate the Baptistry. Brunelleschi, DiVinci, Donatello and Ghiberti all contributed. It is Ghiberti's bronze depictions of biblical events that have become the most famous. He spent 21 years working on it.

Inside the Duomo
The interior of the Duomo is nowhere near as nice as the facade. It's kind of simple inside. There is some nice fan vaulting and a few statues, but it doesn't convey the sense of awe I felt in other cathedrals.
This is a shot of the dome. I also took a few other interior shots hoping to depict the simplicity of the place but I have not mastered the art of taking indoor shots with my digital camera - too blurry and dark.

Ok, if you insist....
This is the interior of the cathedral. Hopefully you can make out something.

Church of Santa Croce
Our guided tour ended after our tour through the Duomo. We were left on our own for a few hours of free time. We decided to visit this church which we had passed by earlier on our walking tour.
You might think that all the famous artists of Florence would be buried in the huge old Duomo. For some reason this smaller church a few blocks away holds the remains of virtually everyone ever associated with Florence.

Italy's Westminster Abbey
Since the church now charged a 5 Euro entrance fee and I had been inside twice befor I opted to wait outside while Gail, her mother, Gen and Tyler walked through.
Inside are the mortal remains of Michelangelo,Galileo, Machiavelli, Rossini, the Ghibertis, Bartolini, and many of the people that kicked Dante out of Florence. When Dante was exiled from Florence he vowed he would never return. This monument commemorates one of Florence's most famous sons, but he is actually buried in Ravenna.

Meanwhile...
While the others took forever to tour the church I found a spot in the shade. I sat on the church steps for close to 45 minutes. I was well entertained by the illegal sunglasses vendors that set up outside the church. Just like the guys we had seen elsewhere the night before, these guys knew just when the cops were coming and put away their cardboard tables and merchandise just as the fuzz drove by.

Next stop, Pisa
Tyler and I got ourselves a quick lunch of Calzones and soda, while the girls had gelato at a little cafe along the Borgo dei Greci, near some of the leather stores. Since I didn't pack enough t-shirts for this hostile weather, I got another cheapie at an outdoor stall.
We eventually got our group reassembled back in the Piazza Della Signoria. It was time to take our excursion to Pisa. Jurgen led us on a high speed walk to the other side of town where Salvatore waited with the bus. According to Mappy.com, we walked almost a mile in the ultra-heat and humidity of Florence in about 10 minute.
Within minutes of boarding the bus most of the kids were asleep. It took about an hour and a half to reach Pisa. When we got there the bus was once again barred from driving in town. We got off at a big bus park then boarded a long propane-powered bus to the complex at Pisa.
Like Florence, Pisa's cathedral has a baptistry, a cathedral, and a bell tower. In the case of Pisa, the bell tower is the tourist attraction.

This is why they come
The Tower was never intended to lean. It was supposed to be perfectly vertical. However it was built on soft soil which caused it to lean during construction. To compensate the top levels were constructed at a different angle in the hope that it would still appear vertical. But the soil is so porous that it continued to tip to its side. Efforts have been made to arrest the inevitable toppling. Only a few tourists are allowed to climb on it each day. Reservations are needed and it's expensive just to go up.

Cathedral of Santa Maria Maggiore
Even though the Tower is the big attraction I really enjoyed touring the Cathedral again. It's very ornate and impressive. Judging by the high arches and lack of buttresses my guess is that this is considered a "Romanesque" cathedral.

Did I mention that it was hot?
Part of the attraction of the Cathedral was that it got us out of the 100+ degree heat outside. Pisa was even hotter than Florence. It wasn't exactly cool inside but it felt much better than outside.

The Baptistry
Even better than the Cathedral was the Baptistry building right next door...

Inside the Baptistry
Other than this interesting altar used for the baptism of infants, there wasn't a whole lot to see inside the Baptistry. It isn't what you SEE that's of note however. The dome and round building have created amazing acoustics inside. We didn't get to see it this trip, but last time we came one of the guards stood in the dead center of the room and began to sing rather softly. The sound reverberated all throughout the building with echo upon echo. It was amazing.
The best thing about today's visit to the Baptistry was that all along the outside wall of the interior were stone benches. They were actually cold when we sat on them.
After we rested a few minutes we walked around the Cathedral complex checking out the hundreds of stalls selling all manner of touristic junk. It was miserably hot so we eventually ducked into a little restaurant for one of my favorites, granita. It's the Italian version of a Slurpee. Unfortunately it costs twice as much and is a quarter of the size of the stuff I get at Wawa. The Italian version is much more syrupy and filling.

Silly Tourists
I was feeling pretty miserable with a full belly and the sun beating down on me. When we came back to our meeting point just in front of the Leaning Tower I was amazed in a bizzare kind of way by all the tourists posing for the same stupid photo shot: Someone standing in the foreground pretending to hold up the Tower in the background. Check out all the knuckleheads in this photo.

Dinnertime
It felt like we waited forever for the local bus to take us back to the big pus park. After sweating off ten pounds in the close confines of the overcrowded but ecologically friendly city bus we finally reboarded Salvatore's air conditioned palace on wheels. Sure enough, half the bus was back asleep within a few minutes.
When we returned to Florence we immediately went off to dinner. We ate at the same place Jurgen took us to the year before. I have no recollection of the name. It was on the second floor of a relatively modern building on the Via dei Neri. Last year it was very cool inside; this year the a/c was off and the windows were open. It was brutal. It "forced" me to order a bottle of Nastro Azzurro.
The meal itself was pretty good. We started with pasta and sauce, followed by a salad and then pizza. As you can probably tell from the photo, it wasn't the best Italy had to offer, but at least it had lots of cheese. Dessert was fresh peaches (snore).
Oh yeah, I also had another beer.
After dinner we strolled around town again. Jurgen took part of the group back to the hotel. The rest of us went off on our own. The five of us did some window shopping then decided it was time to walk back to the hotel. When it was time to return to the hotel all of a sudden all of the people that supposedly knew the way back joined us for the walk back. I led us back on a somewhat circuitous route yet i knew exactly where we had to go.
On the way back we bumped into Jurgen who told us we were lost. He told us to take a different road than the one we were on. When we went the way he said to go, we got temporarily lost. We ended up going way out of our way, but eventually Tyler and I got us back to the hotel.