Florence, Italy

In Florence we again were staying in an apartment which just happen to be right across from the Basilica of Santa Croce where Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli as well as other notable Italians are buried. This apartment was also quite spacious, but to get to it we had to climb 57 steps and the wifi and air conditioning wasn't working so this put a of a damper of the place.

The first evening we took a cooking class. Turns out Kimberly had signed us up for a private class so it was just the 3 of us and the chef. We started by preparing 2 types of dough with eggs and one with water. We would be making 3 different types of pasta, spaghetti, ravioli (filled with eggplant and riocotta cheese) and orecchiette. We also made a meat sauce and fresh tomato sauce. Kinsey was a natural in the kitchen, the chef commented on her skills a number of times. Kimberly wasn't too bad for a person that really doesn't like cooking, and I was ok, but really struggled with the orecchiette. The orecchiette was made completely by hand where the other 2 we used some hand-held machines.

The food was really good and we had a very good white wine to go with everything. They gave each of us a booklet with the receipes of everything we made so we'll be able to impress friends and family with our new skills.

Our 2nd day in Florence will be known as the day of tours.

We started with a walking tour where our guide talked about the differences in some of the art work, the purposes of the different buildings and also some of the things women did back in the day in the name of popularity and beauty. Things like putting lead based white paint on their faces or soaking their hair in their own urine and sitting out in the sun so the ammonia in the urine would dye their hair blonde (and I don't even like wearing make-up).

The second tour was of a portion of the Uffiziz museum. Our guide went over a few of the paintings and sculptures to give us some background details. I could tell she was quite passionate about artowrk.

The last tour was the one I was looking forward to the most, it was to see Michelangelo's David. There is a copy of the statue in the main square, but it was the real one that I wanted to see. Before seeing the statue lining the corridor are what appears to be unfinished pieces from Michelangelo. They are pieces that Michelangelo had been requested to do, but then later it was determined that they were not needed. Michelangelo believed that he was not creating the sculptures but that he was freeing the exsisting piece from the marble blocks that he had personally choosen. Looking at the unfinished blocks it did appear that they were trying to break free.

The David statue is much larger than I expected. It's hard to imagine one person working on something so large. Michelangelo was an artist that liked to have his sculptures be as accurate as possible, and to do this with the human form he dissected human cadavers (even though this was not allowed). This is the reason when looking at the David statue all the muscles and body parts are so accurate. The statue was orininally suppose to be placed up high on the outside of one of the churches in Florence but once the finished product was seen it was determined that it would be a waste to have something so magnificant up so high. Due to how people were going to be viewing the statue in the original location Michelangelo made some of the proportions on the body larger (mainly a hand and feet) than others so the view from below would be at the best angle.

It was well worth a day of walking to see this statue.

Since we were so close we decided to take the train to visit to province of Pisa and it's leaning tower. The tower is actually the bell tower for the cathedral right next to it. There is also a cemetery that is worth a visit. The place where you buy your tickets there is a short film that talks about the history of the towers and the efforts that have occured to keep it from completely falling over.

Since it is a very popular area with tourist there are of course souvenir booths, probably some of the tackiest booths I've ever seen, and the entire walkway was filled with them.

Surronding all the monuments in the area are some beautiful green lawns. While on a hot day they are quite inviting, there are very clear signs requesting people not to go on them. However once again there are those people out there that feel that such instructions are not meant for them, so there were always people on the lawns. Every once in a while the security guards would blow their whistles and wave them off. At one point we came out of the Fresco museum and the lawn in front of the tower was almost completely filled with people. I think the guards must have been on a break and everyone just went nuts, there was one lady lying on her back with her feet in the air. The 3 of us we so stunned we just stood and watched for a bit. Finally the guards returned and it took a bit to get everyone off.

To climb the tower (296 steps) you must buy your tickets and they will tell you what time your turn is. They only allow small groups (~25 people) to go up for about 30 minutes at a time. We've walked up many things with a lot more steps but this walk was made more challenging by the fact that gravity was pulling us towards the middle of the stairway, and since there were people coming down we had to fight to stay on the proper side. The marble steps were smooth and indented from all the feet having trampling on them over the years. At one point I thought we had reached the top only to find out that there was one more really skinny stairway to climb. On top the railing that goes around the tower was nowhere near as tall as I thought it should have been, I'm sure my dislike of heights wasn't helping. It was probably a worst feeling if you were taller, at least for me the railing came to my waist. Needless to say I did not stay up top for too long, I got my photos and got out of there. It's still definitely worth a visit.