Matt and Lisa's Adventures

6 January 2023

Up early and we caught the metro to the train station. As always with Italian trains, you only get told the platform ten minutes before boarding and then there is a mad scramble to get onboard. Thankfully the train is very modern and comfortable, a big improvement after the French trains. The train was also high speed which meant we only had a couple of stops and arrived in Florence at ten am. We headed to our apartment which is next to the cathedral in the centre of town. It is a great location, but also very busy outside and very noisy in the early morning – so it would prove hard to get a good night’s sleep!

We tried to check in but were too early so we went for a walk. The cathedral is very impressive, the third largest in the world. It has a massive dome and a very high bell tower along with a separate baptistery, which I had never see before. It is white and a different style from the other cathedrals we had seen on the trip. We went for a hot chocolate and this was the first truly Italian one of the trip with rich chocolate and a lot of cream on top – it was delicious! We then just wandered around the area. There were a lot of outside markets and Lisa purchased a couple of inappropriate magnets. The stalls were all very similar with most selling handbags, belts and jackets (apparently Florence is well known for its leather products). They didn’t look busy and it was unclear how much money they would make. I suspect they would do much better in the high season. Even though it it’s the low season it is still very busy in the city and I would hate to be here for the peak crowds in summer. 

We went to a food market, which was like a local food court in a large building, for lunch. The food was very good (pizza) but it was crazy busy and chaotic. We then checked in and our apartment has two rooms which was a surprise. This means no tubing for me while we are here which is a nice break. 

We tried to go to the cathedral but it was closed for visits today, so we could only get photos from the outside.

We then walked towards the river getting distracted along the way by the lego store (very cool Titanic set there) and an American Indian playing a musical instrument. At the river we found the famous bridge (Ponte Vecchio) which has lots of shops on the bridge itself. It seemed like a weird thing to have built but was very popular. Most of the shops were selling gold and it was hard work getting across because it was so busy. There was a witch on the bridge and Lisa was not keen on that. 

On the other side of the bridge was the Pitti Palace and associated gardens. As it was getting late we did the gardens first. There were a lot of steps initially but this meant we went up to get a great view of the city and the park. The park had lots of statues and fountains but they were all in need of a clean. The gardens were very nice and great to have a green space like that in the city. The palace was very impressive and we walked through admiring the rooms and the art. However, after a while it all became same same and it was hard to see the difference between the rooms. As it was getting dark we headed back. The palace was huge, it really emphasised how much money the rulers of Florence had. 

We were booked in for an after dark walking tour at 7pm. We tried to find a restaurant for dinner beforehand but we were too early as most places don’t open until 7pm. We ended up having to go to McDonald’s for dinner. The walking tour was with Angela and was very good. We did a large amount of walking and had some great stories along the way:

• The first was about a woman who moved from Venice to be with a man in Florence but she ended up unhappy. She then met a new man who was the Duke of the city but both of them were married. Somehow both of their partners died (the Duke’s wife fell down the steps at the Pitti palace and the man was murdered on the street) and they were able to marry. The people were unhappy about this and they called her the “whore from Venice”. However both of them soon died as they were apparently poisoned. It was suspected that the Duke’s brother (who was a cardinal) poisoned them so that he could become duke. Which he duly did. 
• There was a walkway between a palace and a church. This was for the daughter of the Duke (formerly cardinal) from the story above. The daughter was born with a disease where her limbs were different lengths and so she was unable to walk. The walkway allowed her to pray in the church without having to go up and down stairs. The people considered the daughter a punishment for how her father came to power. The daughter died at 35 and the walkway was boarded up and is still not in use today. It is said that the ghost of the daughter still inhabits the walkway. 
• There was a lady who married a man but then the man had to go to war. The lady sat at the open window waiting for him to return. She was there so long that she grew old and eventually died. The window was closed by the new owners of the house but weird stuff happened. When they reopened the window the weird stuff stopped. As a result that window has always been left open. It has now been welded open and the room is used for storage. I guess this is something real estate agents would need to disclose to potential owners in the future
• We passed a statue of Dante who’s was a famous Italian writer and made working in Italian cool for the local writers. 
• There was a serial killer called the “Monster of Florence”. He would kill young couples in the countryside and would mutilate the bodies. The cuts had almost surgical precision. He killed eight couples. Police eventually arrested someone but he was later freed by a judge who said that because he was sixty he was too old to have done the killings. However, the killings did stop while he was in prison. The guide thinks the real killer may have moved to a different part of Italy as there were other weird killings around the country. 
• The last stop was where a mafia assassination occurred. In the 1990s the police cracked down on the mafia and so the mafia tried to push back by attacking northern Italian cities. They exploded a bomb at midnight. This killed a student who was walking past and a young family of four who were asleep. There was a poem on the wall from a nine year old girl who was killed. There are several monuments in the area to commemorate this attack. 

7 January 2023

Up early but this time for the Tuscany in a day tour. We met at the train station and after a short walk boarded the bus to Sienna. It was about an hour on the bus with Angela our guide and Nando our driver. 

Sienna is an old town that used to be a major rival of Florence. The two cities fought a lot wars and the people from the cities hated each other, it sounded like a very mean rivalry. There was a fort on a hill between the two cities that was well protected as it was constantly attacked by either side as it was effectively stuck in the middle of a perpetual war. Sienna is a UNESCO world heritage site and has been preserved as it was. It helps that Sienna had 150 years where not a lot of progress was made in the city which helped to keep the city feeling older. 

In the city we had a local guide called Donatella. She was an older woman, very knowledgeable and quite funny. She guided us around the city:

• The oldest bank in the world is in Sienna and is still operating. The city owes a lot of its wealth to banking. Donatello said there are three types of people in Sienna: those employed by the bank, those who had left the bank and had those who would be employed by the bank
• The cathedral was very impressive. It was meant to be larger than the one in Florence (back to the rivalry) but the extension wasn’t completed however you can still see the work they did. The cathedral they did finish had some amazing artwork. In particular a small room had fantastic frescos that had never needed to be restored. The floor also had a lot of amazing pictures which makes the cathedral quite unique
• There was a large hospital that was built in the 1200s and was used until 1995. 
• There is a large town hall that has its own tower. It almost looks like a cathedral itself. 
• Outside the town hall is the town square. 

Sienna is famous for the horse race that occurs twice each summer. It has been running for hundreds of years. The city is split into 17 districts and for the race ten horses are randomly assigned to ten of the districts (the other seven miss out). The horses race around the perimeter of the square three times while the crowd watch from outside or inside the square. The riders are bareback and have whips for hitting other riders (rather than their own horse). The winner is the first horse to complete, with or without its rider. It is the highlight of the town calendar and the people are crazy about it. On the day of the race each horse goes into the church and is blessed. If the horse shits in the church that is considered particularly lucky. 

After the tour we grabbed a hot chocolate with cream, which was amazing. 

Next stop was a farm for lunch. The lunch had four wines, one red, two white and a desert wine. It had four courses:

• Bruscetta
• Bolognese and pasta 
• Roast pork and roast potatoes
• Biscuits with almonds that you dip into the desert wine

The lunch was delicious and we enjoyed the wine as well. So did the rest of the group, you could hear the volume of the room get louder as the alcohol kicked in.

It was then a long winding drive to our final stop in Pisa. We took the obligatory photos in front of the tower and wandered around the cathedral and baptistery. We didn’t go into any of the buildings as it required tickets, we were a bit over it to spend the time waiting in line and we only had a limited time in Pisa.

The tour was fantastic and we got to see a lot of Tuscany in a single day. The food was great and the tour was very well organised and run. Big thanks to Alan and Gail for recommending the trip and for the Christmas present. 

Lisa also tried to emulate the legend of her mother by asking a rude question while we were boarding the bus. I chose to ignore this, as it was very immature. 

Upon getting back to Florence we quickly found a nice Italian restaurant (that I had scoped out earlier). We both had lasagna and it was delicious, it even came with a salad which helped with the feeling of healthiness. There hasn’t been a lot of vegetables on the trip so far.

8 January 2023

When we went to the Pitti Palace our ticket also included entry to the Ufezii gallery for this morning, however along the way we had lost those tickets which was disappointing but meant we could have a later start. We finally made it out about 9:30 and went for a hot chocolate before our walking tour. This tour was covering the main sites in Florence’s old town and was with an excellent guide, Camilla. Highlights:

• Lots of details on the Medici family who used to rule Florence. Their emblem features six balls and these symbols can be found all over Florence and wider Tuscany. They also use oranges as a symbol, as it is like a ball. Camilla showed us a painting that had oranges it in to symbolise that the Medici family had funded the painting. These symbols were very useful as at the time as most people weren’t literate and it was easier for people to understand the symbols
• The Medici family were bankers who charged a high level of interest which the church wasn’t happy about. The family therefore donated large amounts to the church to help forgive their sins. In many churches the outside is unspectacular but the inside is ornate as all the money is spent on the altar as that is closer to god and therefore more likely to help the donors get into heaven
• There is a ball on the Florence cathedral as the Medici family financed the dome. The ball has fallen off twice and both times was associated with bad things happening in the city. 
• After the main part of the cathedral was completed it took 150 years for the dome to be finished. This was because people didn’t know how to construct such a massive dome and it took time for someone smart enough to be born who could complete this. The cathedral must have been a bit weird with this key aspect missing
• The cathedral facade was completed in the 19th century and they included famous artists on the facade. They were placed below god but above the apostles and the popes who had come from Florence. Shows a clear indication of the priorities of the city!
• After the main Medici leader died a priest took power with assistance from other powerful families in the city. He preached a life of poverty and pushed people to burn their treasures. A lot of amazing art and other heirlooms were lost in this period, who knows what amazing things we could have had if this had not happened. After a few years the people got sick of this and so they burned the priest. The Medicis retuned to the city and this time made themselves grand dukes (like kings) so they had all the power
• The David statue was originally going to be placed on the cathedral pointing towards Rome. This was a clear indication to Rome that Florence wanted to be independent. However, when the statue was completed it was considered too beautiful for that location and placed in the main square instead. Today there is a replica of the statue in the square along with some other amazing statues
• Eleanor, one of the Medici duchesses was a demanding women.  She demanded a new palace and garden, then got pissy when it was too far away from the city. She didn’t want to travel into the city alongside other people and so her husband built a 1 kilometre long tunnel from the palace to the city going through the tops of buildings. This included a portion across a bridge. The bridge used to house butchers but Eleanor didn’t like the smell and so the duke got rid of them and mandated jewellers instead, who are still on the bridge today. 
• There were medieval flag throwers in one of the squares as we went by. It was pretty cool, but a bit loud on Lisa’s ears. 
• Outside the Ufezzi gallery there were statues of all the important men of the city, including Michelangelo, Leonardo, Donatello, Galileo, Machiavelli. 

It was then off to the Academy gallery where the David is located. David is certainly very impressive and your eyes are drawn to it as soon as you see it. The statue is large and incredibly detailed. You can see the veins in his arms, his ribs, his finger nails. It just seems so amazing that something that intricate could be carved from a massive piece of rock. It also leaves no margin for error if too much is removed, as clearly Michelangelo wouldn’t be able to undo any mistakes. Even Lisa was quite impressed by the statue, and it is hard for Lisa to be impressed by art. 

Lisa spent an hour in the gallery and I spent two. They had some other incomplete statues by Michelangelo. There were a lot of paintings by various Italian painters. Most interesting was a room full of plaster casts from a sculptor. The sculptor used them as part of their process before they started sculpting the marble. It was creepy seeing all of the casts in the room particularly with all of the heads. 

After the gallery I met Lisa by a local church and we went for a drink before heading back to the apartment for a rest and a beer before dinner. We found a local restaurant for dinner and I had the lasagna (again and it was good, again) and Lisa tried the risotto. She said it was nice but I tried it and didn’t agree. I think she may have been telling me that to avoid admitting she made a mistake. Lisa had been wanting tiramisu and so we had desert, I had the traditional chocolate cake which was only ok. 

Florence overall:

• Felt very similar to Venice, very touristy and lots of people in the city centre. 
• Easy to get around, everything is within walking distance. 
• Our apartment was good in the fact that it had two rooms and a kitchen area, however it was cold and noisy. Staying in the dead centre of the city was good for being in close proximity to locations but the noise was a downside. It was weird waking out of our apartment and ending up on such a busy street. It felt like the apartment was an oasis compared to the busyness outside
• Our apartment came with an alarm which we set every time we left. A bit unclear as to why an alarm was necessary…
• There was still quite a few things we would have liked to have done in Florence and another day or two would have been good. The things we missed were: going inside the cathedral, Ufezzi gallery, Leonardo museum, Medici museum, Galileo museum, walking to the Michelangelo piazza on the hill for views of the city