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Published: April 28th 2015
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Donatello put on a huge spread of food for us to choose from for breakfast so we pigged out on fruit, cereal with yogurt and pastries. Well, we shared a pastry so we didn't pig out too much!
Bernie had pre-purchased our ticket to visit the Uffizi Gallery so we walked straight from the B&B to the gallery to make our 9.30am timed entry. We exchanged our voucher for our tickets and then joined the pre-purchased ticket queue. Although this queue was much shorter than the one to purchase tickets the screening point was shared with groups so we had to wait a bit while a large group entered ahead of us.
The Uffizi Gallery is one of the most famous museums in the world holding works of art by great Italian artists such as Botticelli, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Raffaello ... just to name a few of the most famous! Its large collection includes paintings from the 12th and 13th centuries and the Renaissance Period between the 14th and 17th centuries. It also houses a huge collection of Greek and Roman statuary.
When we exited the Uffizi Gallery we found ourselves in the Piazza della Signoria
where we photographed the statues at the front of the Palazzo Vecchio before walking across the Ponte Vecchio where all of Florence's most expensive shops are located. It certainly looks much more attractive on the bridge than looking at the backs of the shops that are a higgledy piggledy collection of structures that hang off the bridge.
We walked back to the Piazza di Santa Maria Novella hoping that the street food market that we saw yesterday afternoon would still be going. Yes! we were able to buy our lunch in the piazza opting today for arancini balls. The best bit though was that we were able to buy Kürtős Kalács (chimney cakes) which were just like the trdelniks that we enjoyed so much when we were in the Czech Republic at the end of 2013. Yum!
Our next stop was the Central Market. The produce market downstairs wasn't open, but the cafeteria upstairs was absolutely filled with delicious looking food. Maybe a good spot for lunch on Tuesday before we catch the train to Venice?! OMG already planning where we'll eat in two day's time - we're not really obsessed with food, we're just open to trying
interesting local eateries rather than the restaurants near the tourist attractions.
The leather market fills the streets just outside the Mercato Centrale so we had a bit of a browse through the stalls resisting all entreaties to purchase leather goods. I did buy a lovely mohair tube scarf for €10.00 though. I just hope that Melbourne has some winter weather that will be cold enough to wear it.
As we walked back through the Piazza di Santa Maria Novella on our way to the B&B we were treated to some folk dancing. Unfortunately just as we found ourselves a good vantage point the forecast rain started to fall. The forecast has been saying that there would be rain since about Thursday so we have done well to get to Sunday afternoon before there has actually been any rain! Since we arrived in Italy we have been hassled persistently by the street sellers wanting to sell us selfie sticks. We reckon that only about three drops of rain had fallen when all the street sellers put their selfie sticks away and whipped out umbrellas!! Talk about opportunistic.
Although we already had cake at lunch time we couldn't resist
buying gelato cones from the Gelateria on the corner of our street. It was slightly difficult though juggling an ice-cream cone and an umbrella. While I spent some time in our room catching up on the blog, Bernie headed out to the laundromat that we had spied earlier in the day. With our clothes washed and draped around our room the next thing to organise was our train tickets to Pisa for tomorrow morning. With the station literally two minutes from the B&B that was easy. We ate dinner at one of the restaurants on the B&B's side of the river tonight. Although the rain had stopped we didn't want to risk a long walk back if started again while we were eating dinner. All good - another delicious meal and no more rain this evening.
Steps for the day 14,224 (9.69 km)
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Janet Morrison
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enjoying your blog and pics
As always your blog takes me along for the journey and the pics are brilliant, you both have such a good eye for an image. Love the colour of the interiors too. Takes me back to our own visit there years ago though of course our photos don't compare. Hooray for digital cameras when you can discard the ones that don't work for you immediately!