Salzburg, Venice and Florence

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Ciao! Since Vienna, we took the train to Salzburg for a day in town of "The Sound of Music." The hills really are alive here and the buses seem to all follow a route that does not match the map....but oh well. We visited Mozartplatz where there was a big carnival going on so the square was packed. We had the best dinner ever at a small restaurant overlooking the cathedral here...cabbage rolls..yum!

Early the next morning, we caught the train to Venice (which was a little confusing since halfway through we had to catch a bus to get around some construction)...but we made it on time to catch our next train. Venice was packed with tourists when we got in at 2:00 PM. We dropped our bags and headed down to San Marco Square where we saw the cathedral and the bell tower and thousands and thousands of pigeons....you know how much I like birds! We got lost in the streets of Venice winding around all of the shops and ended up on the far side of the island...oops!

The next morning we went up the bell tower and into the cathedral before the line-ups started to form. The view from the top of the bell tower (an elevator up..yay!) was gorgeous. You can see all the islands and water surrounding Venice. We spent the afternoon around the shops and then had a siesta before dinner. After dinner we went back to the square to see the dueling orchestras playing at the sidewalk cafes. The square is much more empty at night so it was a beautiful way to spend the evening.

Yesterday we got into Florence in the afternoon. We spent the first part of the evening doing laundry (boo!) and then had a nice dinner of pasta and proschuito (probably spelled wrong) and Phil even enjoyed the wine! This morning we hit the Duomo early and climbed the 464 steps to the top (Phil skipped one so it was only 463 for him). We had an amazing view of the city (and some smog) from the top. Tonight we are going to see the David at the Accademia and tomorrow morning we have reservations for the Ufizzi Gallery and its collection of Renaissance paintings.

Ciao for now!

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Photos

Duomo
The view from 464 steps up.