Italia Part 2 (Florence & Venice)

After driving through the scenic countryside of Italy, we arrived in Florence.  Unfortunately, I came down with some kind of cold that put me a bit under the weather, but I tried not to let it ruin our sight-seeing!

Florence

See more Florence pictures here

Florence was probably our favorite stop on this trip.  It was picturesque, quaint, had so many things to do, and best of all, we felt like we were the only tourists there!  There are definite pluses to traveling in the off-season!  We stayed at a hotel, San Gallo Palace, that we found on Expedia at the last minute, which was amazing!  We got a really good deal on it, but it was close to all of the sights and had an AMAZING breakfast included each morning (if you know Nick, you know this was a big deal to him).

The first night we got in kind of late, so we just found a cute little trattoria recommended in a Rick Steves' book (not sure I will ever travel again without one of his books) and enjoyed a delicious Italian dinner and wine.  We all thought the food was great, and as we were leaving the owner gave us his business card and asked us to write a review on TripAdvsior for him because he'd had some negative ones recently, but only because he was tired so his food wasn't the best.  Haha, too funny!

At Ponte Vecchio Bridge

Friday morning we woke up with the plan of attempting to get into the Uffizi museum.  We'd tried to book tickets online ahead of time, but were unable to, and were worried that meant it was sold out.  Sold out--ha! After reading about 3 hours lines in Rick Steves' books, we couldn't believe it when we walked right up and bought our tickets.  No waiting at all, even without reservations.  The Uffizi is very large and has tons of artwork.  Luckily, we had good ole Rick Steves on our iPhone to guide us in a 50 minute audio tour around the museum.  Neither of us are huge museum people so having someone to tell you the important stuff and make you laugh was the way to go.  I'm sure we got some strange looks, as we were the only ones laughing as we gazed at paintings.  (By the way, if you don't have this FREE app, I would highly recommend you get it, if you plan on coming to Europe!)  The highlight of the Uffizi for both of us was seeing some Boticelli works, including the Venus painting. (No pictures allowed, unfortunately).

Florence Duomo

The rest of the day was spent exploring the Ponte Vecchio, eating some YUMMY brick-oven pizza, and visiting the Duomo.  The inside of the Duomo was quite beautiful.

Despite the fact that I wasn't feeling very well (even after a stop to the Italian Farmacia for some meds), we decided to take a hike up to the top of the hill to Piazza Michaelanglo for a view of the city.  Our plan was to stay until sunset, but the clouds just kept rolling in, which meant no sunset.  It was still beautiful though!  It's a good thing we decided to walk down when we did because it started raining when we got back to town.  Which, of course, meant a stop at a gelato shop to wait out the rain! :)

Where's the sun??

We ended our time in Florence with a trip Saturday morning to the Academia to see Michaelangelo's David. This was probably one our favorite things we saw in Florence, but unfortunately, no pictures were allowed. :(  But, if you happened to click on the photos link, you might see some pretty cool pictures of Florence ;)

Breathtaking, even without the sun!

Summary:  We LOVED Florence, and would highly recommend visiting if you get a chance.  Great food, great sites, and just a peaceful city to be in.  I'd love to go back, especially to see some sunsets and visit some of the surrounding countryside.

Venice

Sad to leave such a beautiful city, we made the drive back to Jason and Alicia's place, which is about 45-60 min. outside of Venice.  They live in the country in a beautiful house at the foot of the mountains.  It was very peaceful and relaxing to spend the night with them.  Jason was kind enough to escort us onto the Air Force base so that we could go to the base grocery store to get some of the essentials that we can't get in Paris.  We said we were going to try and embrace the French culture and not rely on suitcases of things to and from the U.S, but there are just a few things that we really miss here.  One being taco seasoning, which I know you can make yourself, but without chili powder it is difficult.  We now have 8 cylinders of Crystal Light (also thanks to my parents for mailing!), which has been a life saver!  We were downing 2 liters way too fast, and we were surprised that we weren't able to find any type of drink mix at the stores here.  If you come to visit, be prepared that your ticket here may include Crystal Light packets in your suitcase! ;)

Just a few of the elaborate
costumes we saw!

Sunday morning we took the train into Venice.  I'm just going to preface this post by saying that I know many, many people that absolutely love Venice, so take what I say with a grain of salt.  See more Venice photos here.

Beautiful

Upon entering Venice the first thing we realize is that this will NOT be like Florence, in terms of the number of people.  It was Carnival, which only lasts for a little over 2 weeks, and is a huge celebration with masks, dresses, and TONS of people!  Apparently, there are larger crowds during this time than in the summer, and the fact that it was a Sunday probably didn't help matters any!  We took a boat tour of the Grand Canal (via public transportation), and with our trusty friend, Rick Steves, learned about some of the history of Venice and got to see all the beautiful buildings.

However, upon arriving at St. Mark's Square, we were greeted with this:

We survived!

Yes, that is literally a sea of people all watching some lady zip-lining from the bell tower.  And I know you're thinking, "Oh zip-lining, cool!" but no, all that means is there was a zip line.  She was very slowly moving down the zip line while she did some artistic dance moves.  Dressed in Carnival gear.  We seemed to be the only 2 people in this whole flood of people that were less than impressed.  All we wanted to do was get to the arched doorway and out of the crowds.  About 20 minutes and lots of pushing later, we made it (and somehow without getting losing anything from our pockets or bags!)  At this point, we were so relieved and happy to be out that all we wanted to do was find a quiet restaurant to sit and eat at.  Which is pretty much how we ended our Venice trip.



Summary:  Well, as you can probably tell, this was not our favorite stop on this trip.  I'd like to think that without Carnival going on, I would have enjoyed it more, but it's just hard to tell right now.  Maybe someday we'll make a trip back there and I'll fall in love with the city like everyone else, but for now, I'd have to say it's not a city I'm head over heels excited to recommend to people.  Although it does make for some nice pictures!