Florence

---

Janine tells me it's Wednesday, I'm losing track of the days but it was a cool and fine morning in Florence. After a nice brekkie of muesli and a croissant finished off with coffee we ventured out to the meeting point to go on our sightseeing walking tour in Florence. Although we were taken on a bus up into the hills of Florence where Leonardo devinci tried to fly and the other side of the river..

Today we soaked up the Academy and Uffizi museums where an amazing array of sculptures and paintings that date back to Roman times BC to the 1500's are exhibited. The Rennaisance changed how sculptures and paintings were created. What amazing talent Michalangelo had to sculpt the statue of David and others of course, but David is a masterpiece.

We were told that the sculpture had been started by another but was unfinished and clothed. Michalangelo went on to create what we just marvelled at. It's 17feet high and with all its weight it seems unreal it stands on the two feet of the statue. It's an amazing feat of balance distribution. Janine kept saying hes just beautiful, she marvelled at the intricacies in the sculpture such as veins on the arm and neck etc....

The paintings in the Uffizi gallery show the changes from the Dark Ages style to the period of the rennaisance when perspective in paintings was introduced thanks to people like Leonardo da Vinci and other talented engineers who designed the massive basilica or cathedrals around Italy.

The rain started late morning and we have just come in from dinner at 9pm and its still raining. Apparently Tuscany has suffered from a drought this year so they are loving the rain, just not the drop in temperature. It's come in unexpectedly cold! Even Janine wore four layers all day today, unprecedented for her..

We have experienced some stoney faced Italians and some really friendly Italians......just depends on their day I guess. We are feeling pretty tired but its been such fun we are just crashing at night after full days Out and about.

Today we are taking the fast train to Venice and have 3nights there before the cruise starts. We both have loved soaking in the culture and atmosphere of Greece and Italy So far. Still more to come!

Unfortunately we have had problems with downloadIng photos so we might not be able to include any from here, Janine will keep trying however..

---