For our very last weekend, my Cinque Terre group (plus a few, minus a few) headed to Florence for two days filled with art, shopping, and good food! Like Venice, I had travelled to Florence with my family about ten years ago, but I didn't remember much about the city, and I was pretty sure I would have a greater appreciation for the art, etc. now that I am older. Right away, we could tell that the main part of the city was very small and walkable because it was only about a ten minute walk from the train station to our hostel. We were extremely well-situated--about six blocks from the Duomo, and two blocks from the Uffizi! We arrived in the evening, so our first introduction to the Duomo was in the dark, and it was beautiful. We had booked early morning tickets for the Uffizi the next morning (to avoid crowds, if possible), so we headed straight to bed.
We got up bright and early the next morning, grabbed coffee and a cornetto (also known as a croissant), and headed to our first Florence museum! The Uffizi was amazing! It is huge, and has an extremely impressive collection. We spent almost three hours there, wandering from room to room. The museum is set up in a U-shape with two long hallways, and a shorter connecting hallway (the bottom of the U). Off of each of the long hallways, are the smaller rooms that house the majority of the collection. The hallways themselves are lined with ancient statues. I will give you a couple of my highlights from the museum: the Botticelli room and ironically, given that I was in Italy, the Dutch art collection. After our visit we each picked up a book or poster in the museum shop, and then headed across the river for lunch. We crossed the Ponte Vecchio, lined with expensive jewelry stores, and headed another few blocks to an alley that housed a Trattoria that I had been to with my family ten years ago, called the Quattro Leoni (the Four Lions). My dad had reminded me that this was a delicious place, so we decided to try it again. It lived up to expectations, even ten years later! I had a pasta with Tuscan sauce (a flavorful meat sauce), which was delicious, and others had amazing pasta dishes as well. The atmosphere of the restaurant was also wonderful. There was a lot of wood and brick, giving a wine cellar kind of a feel. After lunch, we stopped in our first Florentine paper store (Florence is famous for its beautiful paper and stationery, and there are paper stores throughout the city). I think everyone left with a card, stationery, poster, or journal of some sort, and their wallets at least a little bit lighter. Next, we went to Santa Croce, a church with chapels by Giotto. The frescoes in the apse of the church are currently undergoing restoration, and so the apse is filled from floor to ceiling with scaffolding. If we had scheduled ahead, we could have taken a tour up on the scaffolding of the frescoes and the restoration project. Sadly, we hadn't realized that this was an option, and since we would only be there for two days, we wouldn't have time to do it. Despite this, the church was quite beautiful and we spent about an hour wandering around and enjoying the various side chapels. In one of the chapels, there was a relic of St. Francis (His cloak! Or at least one of them...), which made us smile, because we had studied St. Francis earlier in the term and spent a wonderful day in his hometown of Assisi. Next, we went into the Duomo, which was actually quite plain on the inside. My friends decided to climb the dome, but because I had a headache, and a dislike of heights, I split off to check out the leather market. Finally, we met up for dinner at a restaurant by Santa Croce that had been recommended by another friend on our program. Here, I had spinach gnocchi with salmon sauce all sitting in a baked parmesan bowl (literally a bowl made of parmesan!). The food was really good, but so rich that I couldn't finish mine on my own (luckily, when you travel with boys, they can always finish your food for you!). We delicious appetizers of cheese, salami, and vegetables! After dinner, we walked around the city in the evening, spending some time in Santa Croce's piazza, and then heading over to the Duomo. When we reached the Duomo, there was some sort of candlelit procession going on. People were processing from the church holding candles. There was a wide variety of people--monks, nuns, and groups holding up banners. At one point, a man walked by under a canopy held by four people. He looked like someone important in the Church, maybe a bishop, but we couldn't tell for sure. He held something in front of his face (some religious object?), so we couldn't really see him. Others in the procession just looked like normal citizens and/or tourists, so I thought maybe they had held a special service in the Cathedral, that had ended with the procession, and anyone who wanted could take part. The procession was quite long, and we watch for about half an hour. As I mentioned in an earlier post, running across events like this are part of the fun of traveling, and thus far in my travels, I've had pretty good luck just happening upon things (flag dancing, midnight services, etc.). At this time, the doors to the baptistery were open, and so a friend and I were able to peek in a get a look at the beautiful mosaic ceilings (without having to pay to go in).
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| The piazza next to our hostel--the Uffizi is just behind it |
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| Palazzo Vecchio |
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| And by night |
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| Ponte Vecchio |
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| Inside Santa Croce |
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| The scaffolding in Santa Croce |
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| Yay for St. Francis! |
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| Santa Croce by day--yes, the sky actually looked like that! |
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| Santa Croce by night--what a photogenic church! |
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| The Duomo and campanile |
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| Inside the Duomo |
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| Candle trees inside the Duomo |
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| The famous gold doors of the baptistery |
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| The candlelit procession |
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| The Duomo at night |
The next morning, we headed to the Accademia to spend the morning with David. As it turned out, there actually wasn't much else in the museum. It was small, and mostly housed religious art. There were a few other things I enjoyed though. They had an exhibit about civil government in Florence during the Middle Ages, and the interactions between the church and government. This exhibit was interesting, particularly because it was relevant to the time period we had been studying. There was also an exhibit on restoration, in which the museum displayed some its paintings, and then had explanations letting you know how they had been restored, etc. I am always fascinated in how works have been changed over time, and so this exhibit was fun for me. There was one painting which had originally depicted Eve naked, but at some point in time, she had been clothed in a fur robe because the owner was offended by her nakedness. When the painting came into the hands of the Accademia, she was restored to her original nakedness because the museum decided they wanted to keep the original intent of the painter visible in the painting. Finally, in the hall leading up to Michelangelo's David, there were about ten of Michelangelo's unfinished statues. It was amazing to see how he possibly went from a block of marble to something as beautiful and polished as his David. The David was beautiful, and I think what amazed me most was its size. I had thought he was about the same size as the Bernini statues we saw at the Villa Borghese (probably about 7 or 8 feet tall?), but he was about twice that size (about 14 feet tall). After the Accademia, my friends headed to the Medici chapel. Instead, I went to another chapel that had belonged to the Medici family, housed in the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi. The chapel, called the Cappella dei Magi, is from the mid-fifteenth century, and is covered in frescoes by Benozzo Gozzoli. The frescoes depict the journey of the magi to Bethlehem, but are also an excuse to depict the important people who arrived in Florence for the Council of Florence in 1438-1439 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magi_Chapel). The frescoes show a procession of people on horseback, making their way through the beautiful and wild countryside. This chapel was probably one of my very favorite things I have seen on the trip. I found it absolutely gorgeous, and I went through the chapel twice, so that I could take it all in. I wasn't allowed to take pictures in the chapel, but if you go here: http://rolfgross.dreamhosters.com/TuscanyFrescoes-Web/Gozzoli.html and scroll down to the chapel in the Medici-Riccardo Palace, you will get a good sense for it (although the colors were much richer in person). After a visit to the Brancacci chapel, which is sometimes called the "Sistine chapel of the early Renaissance," and has frescoes by Masolino da Panicale and later finished by Filippino Lippi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brancacci_Chapel). Finally, I finished my day by climbing the campanile, or bell tower with two of my friends. We hiked up the 400+ stairs until we reach the top. Luckily, the stairs are enclosed, and at the very top you are entirely enclosed in a sort of cage, so if feels very secure even though you are so high up (the top of the Duomo only has a waist-high railing). We got an amazing view of the city, the countryside, and of the Duomo! We could wave to the people who had climbed the dome! The view was spectacular, the wind was blowing our hair in all directions, and it was the perfect way to end a wonderful two days!
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