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Published: November 8th 2010
View of the "Oltrarno"
...other side of the ArnoThis morning we headed across the Arno again to see the wooden crucifix by Michelangelo in Santo Spirito Church. The story is that Michelangelo gave the crucifix to the church in gratitude for letting him sneak in to the affiliated hospital "where the young Michelangelo enjoyed free rein for his studies of anatomy". We briefly wandered through the market in the piazza outside the church, then went on to the Pitti Palace and Boboli Gardens where we ended up spending most of the day. At the Pitti, we viewed a special exhibit of Caravagio's and followers' paintings, had a tour of the "King's Apartments", wound our way through the many other Versailles-like rooms of the Apartmenti Reali, that had once been inhabited by Florentine movers & shakers---from the Pittis (big banking family) and their rivals the Medicis in the 1500's, to the Dukes of Lorraine who ruled Florence in the 1800's and remodeled much of the Palace. One wing has been turned into the Pallantine Gallery, filled to the heavily decorated ceilings with paintings, with a few notable ones by Lippi, Botticelli, Titian, and Tintoretto. We quickly toured the Costume Exhibit, which should be on the list of anyone with even
a remote interest in fashion. After a quick lunch we headed out back to the the Boboli Gardens, and detoured to the nearby Villa Bardini Gardens (covered by the same ticket) which offered lovely views of Florence spread out below.
When Chris was done with his school obligations for the day, we met him back at the Boboli Gardens. Once we had our fill of wandering through it, we went back into the Pitti to view the Treasury Exhibit and then a special exhibit on the history of wine-making in Italy--fascinating and well-done--wish we'd allowed more time. But we needed our daily gelato fix, so we headed for the incomparable Vivoli's. Then we finished up with a quick peak at the bronze doors of the Baptistry in Piazza del Duomo, which had been too crowded to view up until now. There Chris bid us goodbye and headed "home".
Dinner was at Buca Mario, which we concluded was a bit of a tourist trap, despite the fact that it had been recommended to us by part-time Florence resident Justin Ermini, the chef at the Mayflower Inn in Connecticut, when we met him at a winemaker dinner in Paso before
we left. However, we did thoroughly enjoy our Bistecca Fiorentina--huge t-bone steak for 2--and "fiori fritti", deep fried zuchinni blossoms... And coincidentally, we were seated next to another American couple who turned out to know the Bero family in San Luis Obispo--our "six degrees of separation" story for this trip!
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