Firenze

Today was a challenging day for the Morgan clan.  Trevor woke up on the wrong side of the mean boy cave and made a point of picking on Drew and the rest of us all day long.  Kuddos to Ryan for not taking it to heart and not getting mad (well mostly - we all took turns getting mad but it wasn't excessive).  At 830 am we met our guide, Rosanna at the Palazzi Medici Riccardo and then headed to Accademia to see David.  Rosanna walked a little slowly and tended to drag on with her descriptions - especially about art.  The children would wander off to sit on a bench and Ryan would wonder off to look at them so I had a personal tour for parts...

Drew made no mention of the "disgusting"male parts on display today.  Ryan thought that the right hand was way too large and our guide explained that the statue was originally meant to sit atop the Duomo and not to be seen close up.  Amazing that this was carved from one piece of marble without a live model or a plaster cast.  I am not an appreciator of art but this is pretty cool.  The place where David was meant to rest is on the Duomo.  If you see the smaller cupola next to the large one and see the wall between the two windows, it was supposed to perch on the little round thing at the end of that wall.

We then stopped at a little shop called Scrapelli which makes mosaics in the traditional Florence style.  The artistry is amazing where they use small metal wire to make intricate cuts in hard semi-precious stones and then piece them together with rosin and beeswax.  The kids enjoyed watching and I really wanted to buy a small piece but the price tag was too daunting.

Then it was off to the Duomo (the Cathedrale) for a quick tour.  The outside is all beautiful Gothic Revival with different colors of marble but the inside is pretty plain just gothic - except for the dome.  Beautiful.  For a while it was the largest church in the world - 502 ft by 295 ft with 75 foot arches.  It is pretty dark inside so not very good pictures.

There are street performers in Firenze just like in US cities.  This guy have out poems on little pieces of paper.  Trevor's seems to be some sort of patriotic thing and Drew's was in German.

Palazzo Vecchio in Piazza della Signoria - this was the Medici's 2nd palace.  In front of this is the Neptune fountain (Italians think it is ugly) and David was originally kept in front of this palace.  During some riots he was broken when someone threw a table out a window and broke his arm.  After that he was moved into the Accademia.

This is the Porcellino in Mercato Nuovo - you rub his nose for good luck.

Our tour guide dropped us off in Mercato Nuovo.  If I had it to do over, I would not have hired this tour guide.  She was boring to Ryan and the children and spent too much time talking about art.  We could have moved at a faster pace by ourselves and enjoyed it more.  Now I am worried that the guide in Rome won't be worth it.  We stopped for lunch at a little spot in this area.  Drew decided to order pesto pasta which she did not like (too much oil) and Trevor ate part of a pancetta and cheese sandwich but he was really distracted by a few birds that kept flying in and out of the restaurant and stealing bits off plates.  After lunch we headed back to Piazza del Duomo to climb inside the famous dome (cupola).  Along the way we stopped inside the Orsanmichelle which is a church that used to be a granary.  Check out this altar!

Climbing the dome involves waiting in line again outside the church.  We met an Australian family in line that had a 9 year old boy and a 10 year old girl.  I began by talking to the children.  We always explain that we are from St. Louis, in the middle of the United States not too far from Chicago.  The girl said that they were from Australia and I think she hesitated to tell me where and I explained that I do not know much about Australian geography at which point the father said "well you are from America so you aren't even good at American geography".  How nice to start things off with an insult, asshole.  Gave me an opportunity to educated my kids on the impression that many people have of Americans.  I will say that the tour guide was surprised that the kids had not learned any world history yet in school.

The dome is an incredibly impressive feat of engineering.  It was built with no support from the outside - just scaffolding.  It is still the 5th largest dome in the world.  There is an inner layer made of bricks (over 4 million in a Herrigbone pattern) and an outer layer.  The dome starts at a height of 171 ft and spans 144 ft.  The climb involves 463 steps sometimes with 2-way traffic on incredibly narrow stairs.  Another "sweat running down your back" experience in close quarters with people who may only be washing their arse in the morning with the bidet!

A really tight fit at times

View from the top is amazing.  We are staying just on the other side of this dome of the Medici Chapel.

Another view from the top

So up 463 stairs and down 463 stairs.  After that, Ryan and Drew were ready to relax so they headed back to the apartment.  Trevor wanted to climb the bell tower, a paltry 414 steps, so that is what he and I did.  He was disappointed that you couldn't see the actual bells that ring and they don't ring during open hours.

After this second climb, Trevor and I went in the Baptistry to have a look around.  The ceiling was beautiful and they have recently restored the rosette stained glass window from the cathedral and have it on display in here.

Trevor and I then strolled through all the vendors around Mercato Centrale selling leather coats, purses, belts, t-shirts, etc and then headed back to the apartment to see if Ryan and Drew wanted to join us at the Medici Chapel next door.  The answer was "no" so Trevor and I set off again.

On display in the Museum of the Chapel were a bunch of Medici Reliquaries.  That was fun to explain to Trevor too - the Catholic Church's belief in breaking famous people up into little pieces so you can have some special connection to them.  This appears to the femur of the Apostle Barnabas in a really fancy container.

Another beautiful ceiling

The tombs of the Medici's.  There are 49 members of the family buried in the Chapel.

Then Trevor and I went back to the apartment for some down time.  That consisted of him watching part of Cars 2 on his Itouch and me taking a 30 minute nap.  One thing we are not doing a good job of is keeping our kids fed enough.  They get really crabby when they are tired and hungry and Ryan is too frugal to get anything other than the bare minimum for breakfast at the store.  I think that is why dinner has been an absolute nightmare every night.  Going forward my plan is to have food readily available for them.  We set out because I wanted to see/cross the famous Ponte Vecchio over the river Arno.  This is the bridge that has been around in some form or other since 966 AD.  It used to be occupied by butchers but now by jewelry stores, well since 1593.

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After this it was 630 and time to find something to eat.  I had wanted to eat in the Oltrarno area but when we crossed the bridge Yelp wasn't showing many restaurants in the area open yet.  The kids were being absolute beasts - Drew was doing the 8 year old equivalent of throwing herself on the pavement kicking and screaming - which is basically just yelling and being hateful to everyone and shouting at her dad that she needed food immediately.

We went to a restaurant off the Mercato Nuovo that our guide had recommended.  We ordered some ravioli with shrimp, risotto with asparagus, and the biftecca fiorentine - a massive Tbone that is at least 1 kg and cooked fairly rare, which we split 4 ways.  It was really good.

Once everyone was fed and watered they were in a much better mood and we stopped for more gelato on the way home.  Then it was off to bed after showers.  The kids still prefer Venice to Florence and I wish we had had time to see more in Florence.  Now we are off to Pompei via Napoli.  Currently on a fast train (going almost 300 kph/186 mph southeast of Rome).  The hotel has a pool so when we get there I think we are just gong to chillax (after I go to the store and ensure and ample supply of snack).

Ciao!