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Published: April 15th 2009
Florence
The huge Duomo of Santa Maria del Fiore with its characteristic dome by Brunelleschi which took 14 years to build.We arrived in Florence at about 11am and the roads were chaotic! Dorothy routed us through the middle of the city and it was a mess traffic-wise. The road the campsite was on had no numbers so we had to put in the GPS coordinates so she could find it, which she eventually did about an hour after reaching the city. (I must highly recommend the Alan Rogers Camping and Caravanning Guide we bought which has all sorts of useful information on the campsites including the GPS coordinates) The campsite wasn’t the cheapest we’ve stayed at but was on a hill overlooking the city and therefore made it really easy to get there and catch a bus back if we needed to. By the time we parked the van it was 32 degrees, but not uncomfortable. (We just wished we hadn’t left our jandals back at Alli’s place!) We decided to have lunch before walking up the road to the Piazzale Michelangelo, a lookout over the city, for a few photos. We later enjoyed happy hour at the bar (€2.50 for a bottle of average red wine) and pizza for dinner.
The next day we donned sun cream, filled up
Florence
The bridges over the River Arno with Ponte Vecchio in the foreground. our water bottle and headed off to the city. We walked along the River Arno, across Ponte Vecchio bridge with it’s little shops, and along to the Uffizi Art Gallery. Florence is labeled the artistic capital of Italy and if you wanted to visit all the attractions you would probably need about 4 days (partly due to the queues to get into them), but not being big on queues we contented ourselves with what we could see from the outside. I’m going to state the obvious again here but there are a lot of statues in Florence, including at least three Davids, not including the original in the Galleria dell’Academia. Our Michelin guide lists about 20 or more poets, painters, sculptors, architects and scholars who hail from Florence - some of which I’ve actually heard of, (which is quite something considering I’m an art history ignoramus!), but names like Dante, Macheavelli, da Vinci and Michelangelo are probably known to most people. I think anyone who is into art history or architecture really needs to visit Florence. Anyway, we kept wandering along to the huge Duomo (one of the largest cathedrals in the Christian world), the Cappelle Medicee and past a
Florence
This lovely building with it's copper dome turned out to be a Synagogue and was under renovation. few other churches along the way. We eventually caught a bus back to the campsite in time for happy hour. Funny thing was, apart from the campsite being full for the Easter break, there were no other signs that it was Good Friday. All the shops were open and the buses were running, but maybe Sunday and Monday will be different. All-in-all we had a great time in Florence with a great campsite and great weather and of course a beautiful city.
Next morning we were off again and heading for our last Tuscan city - Siena.
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Ally
non-member comment
Am blind!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I can't open your photos?????? Wanna see them!!! Do you know why the river is alled 'Arno?'....coz there 'Arno' fish in it. te he.