Day 111: Satuday, May 7, 2011

Hello!  I’ll be your guest writer for our last day in Italy…Jackie can walk you through our flight back on Sunday which consisted of the best ice cream I’ve literally ever had, the nastiest chicken salad sandwich I’ve also literally ever had, a really terrible Vince Vaughn movie, and a lot of quality snuggling with my sister. 

View from our Tuscan villa

But first: Saturday morning we woke up in our quaint Tuscan abode both sad that it was our last day, and so excited to go to Florence.  Jackie had insisted we see Florence before we left, so we made it a point to fit it in our schedule.   While picking up my shorts to go on a morning run, a 6 inch long creature with at least 48,000 legs decided to scurry out and start charging for my bare feet…SICK!  Jackie and Mom immediately bolted to the kitchen with me following, while Ellen took care of this beast.  Man were we roughing it (please see picture of our balcony and view below to really capture the sarcasm of this statement).

Christi and I outside our place

We got in the Hummer to head over to Florence – the views on our car rides were some of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.  We constantly got to wind through vineyards, Cyprus trees, green rolling hills, olive groves, beautiful country houses and wineries, and the bluest sky and brightest sun. 

Ponte Vecchio Bridge

When we arrived in Florence, we tried really hard to find parking that was easy to find so we could avoid the debacle our free parking caused in Siena.  Thus, we paid 20 euros to park for a few hours outside the gates of Florence.  After a lot of fumbling with the parking meter and several unsuccessful attempts to get help from passerbys, we began our walk in and eventually reached the famous Ponte Vecchio bridge.  It originally was lined with butcher shops over the entire bridge, but now has nothing but gold and silver and jewels in its shops..which makes for excellent window shopping and an absolutely gorgeous view of Florence architecture and the Arno river. 

Ponte Vecchio takem from the parallel bridge

We followed signs in Florence for the Duomo and central plaza, since this seems to be the way to go in every Tuscan city.  But we were in absolutely no hurry to reach the plaza, since every street in Florence is just enchanting.  It is such a clean, beautiful, romantic, bustling city with the most fascinating buildings and sculptures and street vendors and markets and people – I loved it!  We spent hours and hours at various street markets looking at leather and jewelry and art and really everything under the sun (but mainly leather).  I bought a wallet for myself and Ross, several bracelets, a DaVinci umbrella, and a painting for Jackie for her birthday. Jackie, Mom, and Ellen all had armfuls of bags as well – it is so hard to resist these gorgeous outdoor shops!  Mom also bought Jackie and I (and herself) these beautiful leather coats from a tall man who looked like Borat who really knew his leather and was quite the expert.  I liked him a lot except for when he told me that the one I really wanted was too small even though I thought it fit perfectly.  It was very exciting to come home from Italy with so many authentic things!

The streets of Florence

After a ton of shopping, we were famished.  We walked the streets to find a good pizza or sandwich vendor, and of course landed in the most disgustingly overpriced unappetizing “restaurant” you can imagine.  First of all, the place itself was sick.  We really did not need to sit down since all the food was ready and in a window out front, but decided to buy a sandwich and rest at a table for a few minutes while we ate.  Little did we know that the act of sitting down would cost us a tax of 7 euros a person to enjoy this dirty nasty table and use their restroom…which was A HOLE IN THE FLOOR!  Seriously.  A hole in a cement floor.  Is that legal????  You had to stand over it awkwardly and it was inevitably messy and just filthy. The food was mediocre to very bad, and the Diet Cokes cost 8 euros a piece – that is $11.20 for a can of Coke…absolutely insane.  Why is Coke so expensive in Italy??  Is there a shortage?  For God’s sakes, someone please ship them some Coke so prices can stop being so outlandish everywhere!  (For some reason this did not seem to deter Mom and Ellen from drinking Diet Coke at every meal and for 4 snacks per day). 

We quickly got over this small frustration that was lunch (actually for the next couple of blocks Ellen threatened to go back and stand in front of the store screaming to everyone that came near to stay away from this overpriced miserable place), and headed for the piazza.  The Florence Duomo is absolutely breathtaking.  The outside is all green, pink, and white marble and it is just stunning.  And we never ceased to be amazed by the size of the structures, they are all so incredibly humongous.  We didn’t go inside because of the multi-block line, but spent time just marveling at the construction of this masterpiece.  The intricacy, the rare colors, everything about it was beautiful! 

The baptistry in front of the Duomo 

We then headed to the Uffizi and to the courtyard that had gorgeous sculptures and architecture and artwork, all outdoors.  It was so neat and inspiring to be seeing this art in Florence, Italy, a city known worldwide for its art and architecture.  While we didn’t go into the Museum, we thoroughly enjoyed the statues and the courtyards and the architecture of these striking buildings. 

Rubbing the bores nose for good luck!  An old wives tail states that
if you rub the bores nose, you'll come back to Florence one day. I
would love for that to come true!

Finally, we decided to head to the car and go back to Milan.  It had been an incredible Tuscan adventure and we were all so enthralled by all we had seen and shared.

In Milan, Jackie took us to her favorite aperitivo which was amazing – why did we not eat every single meal there???  Tons of food and options and a drink for such a cheap price, and a very cool place.  We loved it.  It was on the Navigli Canal, which is lined with restaurants and bars and clubs, and was bustling with everyone out for happy hour.  Very cool that Jackie has this within walking distance of her apartment and school!

At the end of a long day we went back to Jackie’s apartment since her roommates had left for home, put on face masks and drank a glass of wine, and went to bed very, very happy.