Florence, Day 3

Florence, Day 3

We offset yesterday's late start by being up in time to (barely) catch the 8am shuttle downtown.  Out tour didn't meet until 9:45, so we walked through the leather market as they were setting up the stalls, looking at the sensory overload of stuff.

Once we were past the market, we went back to see the sculptures at Piazza della Signoria that we'd only glimpsed on our tour with Charles.  I was particularly fascinated by Hercules slaying the centaur, though the much more famous "Rape of the Sabine Woman" is in the same area.

We still had time after that for cioccolatta at the amazing place Charles had taken us to on Wednesday.  This is the best chocolate we've had, slightly less sweet than some of the others.  Charles told us that it ought to be, as Caffe Rivoire was founded by the Savoia royal family chocolatier while Florence was the Italian capital (between 1865 and 1871) and has been serving hot chocolate from his recipe ever since.  Even Lyle went with chocolate over coffee (he'd had coffee at the hotel) this morning.

I was planning to blog about dogs today, but the camera didn't cooperate sufficiently, so I will just introduce you to Thomas, who we met while having our chocolate.  He was delightful, though I think his humans were somewhat confused by the American tourist who asked to take his picture.

When we were done with chocolate, we went over for the usual panic about WHERE ARE WE SUPPOSED TO MEET AND WHERE IS OUR GUIDE?!  This is not Lyle's favorite part of traveling with me.  We did find our guy, and it turns our we were the only two for the first part of the tour, which was primarily a rehash of parts of our day with Charles (though obviously Charles was way better), though we did get to see a cool three-dimensional map (developed for the visually impaired, but really helpful for the spatially oriented too) and learn that the duomo's marble is the three colors of the Italian flag, and that those colors represent faith (white), charity (red), and hope (green).

Then we went back through the duomo and didn't learn anything Charles hadn't already told us, and then we got to go up on the terrace, which was pretty awesome.  We both felt like that part of the tour was given more time than it really deserved, but the views were absolutely awesome.

From the terrace, we climbed up to the dome and then the lantern.  Tiny skinny, twisty steps, and one of the people on our tour chickened out at the second level, which was sad and funny.  The views of the frescoes on the dome were WAY cool up close.  This isn't the best photo, because we were shooting from behind plastic, but that is a demon eating a human.

Then we climbed the rest of the way up to the lantern and went out on the top.  This part had two way traffic on those steps, which was ridiculous and stupid and they should probably institute some traffic control, but the views were just awesome.

We fought the crowds on the way down, went over and checked out the Baptistry, and then wandered back toward the train station to find lunch.  We tried one place, but got ignored, so went down the street where we got accosted by a crazy woman with fried bread.  Yep, we'll eat here.  Need I say we had pasta?  We also had more fried bread.  Lyle wants me to point out that if any of you would like to write bad TripAdvisor reviews for "Rude Staff, Indifferent Service, Nonexistent Food", the name of the place is Caffe La Rose by the SMN train station in Florence.

Then it was onto the train station where we met our group for a wine tour in Tuscany.  This is the part of the blog where I point out how glad I am we're doing our Italy by train thing instead of the bus tour we (and by we I mean Lyle) originally considered.  I was not a happy camper, but we finally did get out and drink some wine in a scenic place that had chickens.  We met not one, but two other couples honeymooning, including one from LA that got married the same day we did and one from Syria, yeah, good choice on honeymooning out of the country there.

This was the day for "all tourists do the same things" and we bumped into the Australians from the car tour this morning, and then had the same Canadian from yesterday's pizza tour on our bus tour today. She was happier on the bus than I was, but that's not saying anything.  We went to another winery after the first one, which required more time on the bus, and then when we were done we got back on the bus.  Terrible way to see a country.  Want to hear about the sweetest thing Lyle's done on our honeymoon?  He admitted that he's been carrying a carsickness bag with him the whole time.  How awesome is he?  Pretty freaking awesome.

We had time for gelato, but as I feared, we are ruined.  Mine was noticeably not awesome, and Lyle didn't even finish his.  Then, to make things more awesome, the shuttle to the hotel was full and we had to cab it.  

Tomorrow, we recover our mojo by getting on a train, and attempt to summit Pisa.

Marty and Lyle