Florence

I continue my story of our journey to Italy. Next stop: Florence. But actually this post will be quite short (or maybe I"ll only have 2 posts about Florence). Because, contrary to our expectations, Florence was not our favorite city. We really did not enjoy Florence as much as we hoped to. Perhaps it was because we were so damn tired by this point (seriously, that plane ride from London to Venice screwed everything up. Never fly from london at 6 AM!! We still can't believe that we had the guts (or actually we were just forced to) to walk around the streets of london at 3, 4 in the morning. No -- the locals don't know it all -- the subways don't run that early. Anyway, London sucked man!). Perhaps the walk up the stairs at that big museum (forgot the name) did a number on our tired bodies (5 flights of stairs, TWICE because when we came down, we realized we missed Botticelli's Birth of Venus). And perhaps it was because I almost got mugged by a group of street Italians........ (Thank God I was wearing a money pouch and nothing in my little sling purse. BUt they tripped me and I almost fell. :( ).

But now we look back, and Florence was charming in its own way. The David was so magnificent and beautiful -- I understood why everyone raves so much about it. Cindy and I are planning to do Italy Round II sometime when we are both married and return with our hubbies. We will do Florence as a day trip instead of a multi day thing.

Here's that handsome devil. Actually, this David is a replica. The original David is housed in a museum (forgot name) built specifically for him. He was so beautiful! I never really knew why he was such a big deal... but man oh man.

Here is the famous Duomo -- you can see the Dome. Florence's architecture was interesting in that it had a distinct style that is remnant from the renaissance. There were many churches and buildings similar to this style -- white with pink and green trimmings. Although I regretted the dinginess, they were very pretty to look at.

I love this picture! This was at the Ponte Vecchio -- which is a market on a bridge (behind me). Little houses and shops were sticking out of the bridge on either sides... it looked like cartoon.