Florence

So I am going to breeze through Florence pretty quick. Florence was not my favorite. It seems it is good for two things. Seeing the David - which was definitely impressive - and shopping, also impressive. We got in to Florence kind of late on...Wednesday?...I am losing track of days. So we got up early and went in to town to go to the Uffizi Gallery. After seeing the works of art in Rome, the Uffizi sort of fell a bit short. I mean there were a couple Michelangelo's and Bodicelli's, but mostly very old 14th century type stuff. And once you have seen a hundred Mary and Jesus paintings...they sort of all look the same.

After the Uffizi we had a few hours to kill before seeing the David at the Accademia. So we (and by we I mean I) shopped....a lot. Florence has TONS of that authentic Italian leather you hear so much about. There are so many leather shops with shoes, purses, gloves, journals, bookmarks, wallets - you name it - made in this awesome leather. You just smell the leather walking by the stores and it is lovely. Now, having said this, Florence is only so big and if you get outside the main shopping area, you are quickly in one of those 'should I be here?' areas, and you quickly turn around. I never felt unsafe or anything in Rome anywhere, but in Florence I feel like I need to watch my back. We saw a couple guys trying to steal stuff from a store window and there is a heavy police presence for vendors selling fake purses, sunglasses, etc. Apparently you get fined 1000 Euro (that's over 1500 dollars!) for buying a fake Gucci bag. Might as well buy a real one!

Anyway, we finally saw the David and that is pretty much the only thing to see at the Accademia. I mean there are a few paintings, but not many. The David is HUGE. And all proportionately sculpted, which is one reason it is such a masterpiece. That Michelangelo knew what he was doing.

After that we headed back to the hotel to deposit our bags and rest before dinner. We went to a place recommended in my guide book - we had very good luck with that so far - but heading that way we were soon in a 'should we be here' neighborhood. However, we found it and it was really cool inside and the place was actually really big and completely empty except for one other American couple...who they sat us right next to. Haha. If you are hungry before about 8:30 or 9 in Italy, expect to be eating only with other Americans. Italians do not eat before then. We are trying to adapt to their culture, but by about 7 we are usually hungry!

Dinner was really good. Jason had this penne type pasta with ragu sauce (not the brand, much better I promise!) and I honestly cannot remember mine, but I know it was good...hmmm. For our second course I had veal and Jason had this chicken stuffed with ham and mozzarella. Both were super delicious. After that we rolled ourselves back to the hotel.

Now, the next day was trying to say the least. I don't really get homesick at all, except for these kind of days when things start going wrong or are difficult. We needed to mail some packages home from all the shopping we did, so I took the packages, and was going to go to the UPS place and meet Jason at the train station. This is about 9:30 in the morning. So I go to the UPS place, but there is not one where it said it was. I even go to an internet cafe and look it up. Yes, I have the right address, but there is nothing there. It is a closed up place. Oh wait, there are two number 11's on this street, but neither are UPS? By now I am very frustrated, but I know I have seen several Italian post offices, and though I would rather not send them Italian mail (I hear about packages never received etc) it seems I have no choice. I won't bore you with my adventures of the Italian post, but let's just say you would have thought I was applying for Italian citizenship with the amount of paperwork I had to fill out to get these packages sent. I did not get to the train station until about 12:30 and by this time Jason thought I had been mugged or something. He was worried, I was stressed, and to top it all off, there was a strike on the train system today! I had heard this happened frequently, but just didn't think it would happen to us. Isn't that always what people think? =) So some trains are running but not all and you have to sort of just figure it out a minute or two before the train leaves. We start to panick thinking we are not going to make it out of Florence that day and I want to cry. I need to get OUT of Florence. Finally we do make it to Pisa - but no time to see the tower with the next train leaving soon - but we do make it to the Cinque Terre. Whew!

I will stop here for now and write about Riomaggiore in the Cinque Terre next. It was awesome.