October 7-9

Oct. 7-We enjoyed a leisurely morning before heading to Siena. Siena has very limited driving within the city, so we parked in a free parking lot next to the medieval fortress and headed to the hotel. Siena is lovely, and if we ever go back to Italy, I'll want to stay in Siena for at least three nights and use the city as a branching out point to visit other Tuscan towns. Our hotel room was cute with plenty of room and a pretty canopied bed. The view from our room was pretty spectacular. It was very close to Il Campo, the square in Siena where people gather. We milled around Il Campo, admired the city hall and Torre del Mangia (city tower), and viewed the Fountain of Joy (Fonte Gaia). We saw the duomo, duomo museum (Museo dell'Opera e Panorama) and climbed 120 narrow, winding steps to get a breath-taking panoramic view of the city. We also briefly explored the crypt and baptistery of the duomo. We ate dinner at a restaurant in Il Campo and then headed back to our room.

You can click on the picture below to see our photos of Siena:

Siena

Oct. 8-We ate breakfast at our hotel and left for Florence. The drive to the city was uneventful. Once we entered the city, the driving was anything but uneventful. We discovered very quickly that Florence is much like Rome with it's tiny narrow streets and seemingly random placement of one-way streets. Our GPS, which up to this point had been extremely useful, became worthless as it told us to go down one-way streets the wrong way, and once we actually made it to our hotel, it kept telling us to turn around. Thankfully JD had purchased maps of the cities we were visiting, so he was able to get us to the right spot. The other complication is that Florence, like Sienna, has very limited driving in the city and will ticket you if you are driving when and where you shouldn't be. Our hotel assured us that they would take care of any ticket as long as we didn't drive in a "public transportation only" area. We don't think we did, but I guess we'll find out in a few months. There are traffic cameras throughout the city to capture the license plate image of cars driving in the wrong area.

Once we were settled in our room, we set out to explore Florence. We made our way to the Uffizi Gallery, an art gallery with a great collection of Italian paintings. We saw works by Giotto, Leonardo, Raphael, Caravaggio, Rubens, Titian, and Michelangelo, as well as a room of Botticellis. We saw his famous Birth of Venus, which looks like a woman coming out of an oyster shell. The best things in this museum (Carey's opinion) are Michelangelo's only surviving easel painting, the round Holy Family, and the view of the Arno River and Ponte Vecchio (famous bridge across the river). After we left the museum, we wandered around the river, walked across the Ponte Vecchio, and took lots of pictures.

We used our borrowed Rick Steves Italy book and did his Renaissance walk through Florence. The walk pointed out the bronze doors on the baptistery of the Santa Maria del Fiore (duomo). The audio guide of the walk pointed out another church, Orsanmichele, with many statues on its exterior (some by Donatello). We also walked by Palazzo Vecchio (city palace) and saw a replica of Michelangelo's David. It stands in the same place as the original once stood. The original was moved to the Accademia (another museum) for its protection. Its left arm was knocked off when someone threw a sofa out of a window of the palace during a protest. Don't worry - they glued it back on. The walk finished up at the Arno where we took a bunch of pictures. Saturday evening we regressed into our American selves. JD was craving food that sounds like Rick Dawn Folds and then we watched the VT-Miami game on sling box.

October 9 - We had breakfast at the hotel and then we set out on another walk. We went back to Ponte Vecchio to try and get more pictures. Then we walked up to Galleria dell'Accademia, which houses Michelangelo's David. We both agreed afterwards that it was our favorite museum, and David is an amazing work of art. On the way back from Accademia we swung through Mercato Centrale and the market around San Lorenzo church. We bought a few things although JD passed on a 25 euro Rolex. From there we walked back over to the Duomo. The line was much shorter than Saturday and we went inside. The only art of note inside was a massive mural of judgment day painted on the inside of the dome. We went back to the hotel for a nap and then skyped with the kids. Isabel dominated the conversation by yelling "Mommy Daddy Mommy Daddy" over and over. We got a kick out of it. We at dinner at Trattoria ZaZa close to the central market. It had very good online reviews and pleased to say those reviews were accurate.

You can click on the picture of Florence and the Arno River below to see more photos from Florence:

Florence Photos