Blogs from Florence, Tuscany, Italy, Europe - page 185

(Entry added January 28, 2006) We headed for a day and a half trip to Florence which was several hours by car away, we made pretty good time, thanks to the Autostrada. Joining us were our neighbors Nick and Janel, and their little boy Xander, and also a friend, Ross. We probably should have made hotel arrangements ahead of time, but we found a place on the opposite side of the Arno that wasn't too far away walking from all the main 'attractions'. We found a nice little place to eat with an outside patio, and I stayed safe and went with the lasagna. Man, it was good! It was starting to get dark at this point, so we all got a feel for the bearings of everything and went back to rest up for the ... read more

Chapter 9 “Where’s Florence?” said Zebedee Rise and shine! Well they arose but the sun wasn’t exactly shining. They were off to Florence today. (both of them had been looking forward to seeing Florence). They caught the bus to the station and managed to catch the 10.59am direct train to Florence. However in the rush, they had both forgotten to validate their tickets, a common practice in Europe, having to validate rather than forgetting to. The guard gave them a very Italian telling off but fortunately felt enough compassion not to fine them. Martin had finally managed to reach the point where he was up to date in his journal, a task more difficult to achieve than at first thought. His brother Steve turned 35 today, making him reflect on how quick their lives were passing ... read more

I had a really good title in mind but I can't think of It now. Yeah we got up at 4am this morning to get to florence. We've been walking ever since. I'm very tired and my feet hurt. We met Lauren and Rob yesterday in Pisa which was good then we went to the beach which was fun too. Florence is really expensive. We went to 4 or 5 places today all of which cost 4-6€ to get in and the hostel was way more than we usually pay. On top of all that I somehow managed to lose a 50€ bill today which really hurt. That's about it because I'm too tired and hungry to write a good entry. Caren wrote a really detailed entry you can read here about our past 2 days ... read more

man we wish we had more time here! but we saw the david, the tombs of galileo michelangelo dante and machiavelli (not tupac, he's alive), santa croce, the duomo, ghiberti's gates of paridise... etc etc. pictures to come. but this is where the renaissance was born so it was reallz interesting to see. good ol michelangelo grew up here so we saw some of his greatest works here too. man, that boz was talented! ... read more

Sunday (Temp. 12deg. Overcast, drizzly) Breakfast in different hotel. Simple, nice coffee, best we have had. Back to hotel to go to toilet. Hit the streets, Duomo etc, Ponte Vecchio, Michelangelo lookout (nice view). Very very busy and crowded. Florence impressive, better if crowds were less. Lunch, pasta at fast food Italian style restaurant. Stroll expensive but nice, especially the wine. Takeaway pizza (dude cut pizza with scissors) more chianti, retired to room watched MTV, only thing in English on 25 channels. ... read more