Florence
Getting to Florence was interesting. And by that I mean, we were confused. From Manarola we had to catch a train to La Spezia. According to the internet (which had got us all the way to our final country without letting us down!) we were then supposed to catch a train to Pisa, then get on a final train to Firenze Rifredi. The first leg to La Spezia? No problemo. At La Spezia the confusion started, when we noticed that the train we were catching to Pisa? Actually went all the way to Florence. What?! We asked at the ticket office and they confirmed that it was headed for Florence. When we were getting on the train Pete asked the driver if this was the train to Florence... the driver replied that we should change at Pisa. Like the internet said! We spent the first half of the journey debating whether or not we should actually get off at Pisa. In the end we agreed we would, because presumably the driver would know best... right?! Well, Pete fell asleep and I kept feeling myself nodding off... then forcing myself awake because I was paranoid about missing the stop. We got off at Pisa, still not convinced it was necessary, but what the hell. We had a bit of a wait so hunted out a little store to buy some food. The final train journey was uneventful until we got to Firenze Rifredi train station... where the internet had told me to get off. Except, the train appeared to be carrying on... even though Florence was definitely supposed to be it's final destination! Hmm, confusion. We got off because we are fools and have blind faith in the internet. Well actually it was all my fault. I'm the fool. I have blind faith in the internet. Oh dumb girl. I was also the reason some other women got off the train, assuring them that this was Florence - "This is where the internet said to get off!". Well technically it was Florence... just northwest Florence... ie NOT the main train station. Oops. That will teach me not to check train stations and just assume that when I typed in "Florence" it understood that I wanted the CENTRAL STATION. I mean, honestly. Why would it assume I wanted any other one?! Well whatever, it was the wrong one. So we had to wait for the next train and I had to deal with guilt because: ALL MY FAULT. It wouldn't have been so bad had I not told those two women they should totally get off here. Am seasoned traveller! Know all! They were good natured about it though, so it wasn't the end of the world. Pete and I were convinced that the train we were waiting for was going to be the train we had originally got on at La Spezia and left at Pisa... we never did find out for sure whether it was, but I would not be surprised!
So we finally got to Florence around four I think. The hostel was easy enough to find, although the pavements were narrow and difficult to navigate with our huge bags. We stayed at a place called Hotel Sampaoli. I wasn't holding my breath about this place... I don't know, for some reason I just felt happier about the hostels we'd booked direct compared to the ones I'd booked via HostelWorld. Having said that, we booked our hostel in Prague via HostelWorld and that was a great little place. Anyway, Hotel Sampaoli wasn't too bad... a bit anonymous but perfectly fine really. It actually felt more like a hotel than a hostel, but a low-star hotel. Which actually, thinking back, it possibly was. Except of course for the shared bathrooms. We spent the next few hours just settling into the room, enjoying our own space again - even though the hostel in Manarola was great, we did miss not having our own space to spread out! There were possibly naps as well.
Our room. We had a telly but it didn't work - the true sign of a classy hotel.
We finally ventured out for a wander and a bite to eat. We went hunting for a place recommended by Lonely Planet, only to discover it was only open at lunch time, and even then only on certain days! However the restaurant was just off a square which had a bunch of other restaurants on it, so we picked one of those at random. After that we searched for some sort of shop so I could get milk (you're now all understanding why I carry so much excess weight, right? I love my dairy too much, agh). However it was a Sunday and pretty late so no milk for me.
At about four in the morning some random drunken chap on a bike stopped in the street outside our hotel and started singing. Badly. And loudly. Our windows were open what with the heat, although they had mesh over them still... we couldn't really do anything about drunken chap though. I mean, would he have understood if we'd shouted "Fuck Off!" out the window? Eventually we heard someone speaking to him (presumably telling him to fuck off in Italian) and after a minute or so of further singing, he finally cycled off.
Had a fairly late start next day... I think we finally got out of the hotel at about half eleven. This was after a rather interesting shower. You see, there was a bathroom next door to our room, its door perpendicular to ours. The bathroom had no shower cubicle or anything, just a shower head attached to the wall opposite the toilet and a drain in the floor below it. Not even a curtain or anything! And this wasn't a particularly big bathroom - sat on the toilet you could probably touch the opposite wall! So it was a "wet room". Never encountered one before. Very very strange experience showering there. The toilet got soaked and we both had to turn the shower off halfway through washing because the water on the floor was getting dangerously close to the door... and there was no doorstop or anything to stop the water from leaking out under the door into the corridor! Crazy.
Once we'd finally emerged into the daylight, we decided we'd get on the right side of some food and grab an early(ish) lunch. We headed back to the square we'd eaten on the previous night and settled for another random restaurant. Pete had his first Italian pizza. Bleeeuuugh. Yeah, hadn't really reconciled with the thought of pizza yet. I did try some though! Just because I thought it would be lame if I went all the way Italy and didn't try pizza. Fortunately the thought of pizza actually nauseated me more than the actual consuming of it. I just had a salad - Italians make good salads.
So! When we finally got going we set off to find the Duomo, which wasn't too far away from the square we were currently on. En route to the Duomo we walked through an open air market, past Basilica di San Lorenzo. There were various renovations going on though, so various routes were blocked off and really we just kind of stumbled around until we spotted the Duomo. We had ice creams to keep us going though, because y'know... stumbling around is tough work. The Duomo is basically... stunning. Really really beautiful.
This photo doesn't do it justice.
Apparently it's the world's fourth largest cathedral... although the size isn't what first grabs your attention, it's just the decoration on the building. It's not gaudy or anything, just... really pretty. It was free to go inside, which was cool. The inside was also rather impressive. I just remain fascinated by how long it must have taken them to paint the inside of the domes... can't have been an easy job! We could have climbed to the top of the cupola inside the church, but decided against it. Instead we chose to climb the campanile just outside. Obviously since it was taller...
...and we all know by now that the point of this trip was to see how many things we could climb.
Yeah. It wasn't actually too bad climbing the campanile. I mean, there were regular landings where you could take a breather. Plus the steps were generally wide enough for two people to pass comfortably. At the top it was a bit cramped though - nothing major really, there were just quite a lot of people up there and not much space to get past them! Views were very impressive though - red rooves everywhere.
Don't worry, there's a close up of that beard coming up...
Cool.
After we'd come back down we wanted to visit the battistero (baptistry) which stands just in front of the cathedral, but for some unknown reason it was closed that day. It's a shame because the battistero is the oldest building in Florence, and also where Dante was baptised! Ahh well. We still go to see its famous Gates of Paradise - bronze gilded doors.
They depict the story of Moses apparently.
From here we had a general wander round various piazzas until we eventually found our way to Piazza della Signoria where Palazzo Vecchio, Loggia della Signoria and the Galleria dell'Accademia are all found. Palazzo Vecchio is the seat of the Florentine government, as well as a ducal palace. We only poked our heads into the entrance hall (long queues, late in the day). Just outside is one of the replica David statues... which we photographed since we figured we weren't going to get to see the real thing!
In my head I always think of the statue of David as "that one with the willy". God help me.
The real thing is actually in the Galleria dell'Accademia just opposite, but we'd read all about how mental the queues are, no matter what time of day and what the weather so we decided not to bother. Replicas all the way! Loggia della Signoria is perpendicular to Palazzo Vecchio and seemed to be like... a building with no front that just housed statues. The whole piazza was ridiculously crowded anyway. After doing our snapping we headed down the road sort of just behind Loggia della Signoria to find somewhere for a quick sit down and drink. We ended up sitting on the steps outside the Galleria Degli Uffizi, where loads of famous paintings are housed - Botticellis, da Vincis, Michelangelos, Raphaels, Caravaggios... you name it! Whilst we were sitting there we got distracted by some street entertainers - first there was a human statue. I can't even remember what he was dressed as now, I just remember being fascinated by him! The other was some guy with loads of face paint on who kept following random people, giving them hugs, kisses whatever... was fairly amusing - some people were really friendly and laughing along, whereas others seemed terrified and ran away!
At the end of the road that Uffizi is on we came to the river that runs through Florence - the River Arno. There's a bridge that crosses the river called Ponte Vecchio, along which a first floor corridor was built to link Palazzo Vecchio with a palace on the other side of the river, Palazzo Pitti. It's the only bridge to survive World War Two bombing and lined with gold and silversmiths.
It's me! And a river! And a bridge!
We headed down and crossed over it, pausing to look in a few of the jeweller's windows just out of curiosity. Yeah, it was expensive. Very expensive. We headed over to Palazzo Pitti once we hit the other side of the river. I have to say, it looked a lot more like a palace that Vecchio! Again, we didn't go in or anything given how late in the day it was. We did take advantage of the cool, shady foyer area for a while though. Ahhhh. It was SO HOT. Even at like, four in the afternoon! From Pitti we did a mini circle taking in...
Chiesa di Santa Spirito...
and a couple of other smaller churches whose names escape me, as well as noting a place we planned to go eat at that night.
Back outside Palazzo Pitti again, we decided to head over to Forte di Belvedere. I had no idea what it was, if there was anything interesting there to see or what. But everyone likes a good fort, surely? It took us a while to get there, climbing up some rather steep roads. We did it eventually though! And then collapsed onto the ground at the top.
BEEEEEARD.
Mostly the fort is just lots of grassy areas, some gardens and a restaurant. It provided a rather good view over the whole city though. And for some inexplicable reason there was a giant sofa up there. It was actually the world's largest sofa, and it seemed to be on some sort of tour.
I know! A SOFA on TOUR!
I don't know, it was a bit strange but hey! We lazed on the grass for ages, before having a wander round the perimeter and then heading back down. I'm not sure if maybe you can go inside some of the buildings at the fort during the day, it seems more than likely! We didn't mind just admiring the views though.
It's not like they were bad views...
From the fort we headed back down again (which involved walking down a steep road with NO pavement) to find the steps up to Piazzale Michelangelo. Insert we-love-the-climbing! joke here. It turned out we timed our ascent up to Piazza Michelangelo pretty well. All the guides say that the sunset from up there is amazing, and we got there about half an hour before the sunset! There's not a lot on the actual square - market stalls selling tourist tat and another David replica (this one in green).
My favourite view.
Still, we just admired the view for a while before going to sit on the west-facing steps at the side of the square ready for the sunset. It actually wasn't as crowded as I thought it might be given how much all our guides seemed to pimp the idea of being up there for sunset! The sunset was indeed beautiful. The view from Piazzale Michelangelo in general was beautiful though... in fact I think it was probably my favourite view over Florence out of all that we'd had that day (campanile, Forte di Belvedere and Piazzale Michelangelo). Maybe it was the dusk lighting I don't know... I just loved the way everything seemed so calm and peaceful and yet the buildings all seemed crammed together and... busy.
Ahhh.
Following on from a successful sunset viewing we headed down (AGAIN) and back to the restaurant we'd spotted earlier. It was a place called Borgo Antico which Lonely Planet promised was amazing and served heaping portions for hardly anything. Them's the sort of things we like to be promised. What they failed to mention was the fact that it was apparently always busy. When we got there they just about managed to squeeze us in without a booking... although we had to share a table with a couple of women and - a bit later - an English guy on his own. I felt kind of sorry for him, but I'm pretty sure he was listening to our conversations and therefore being suitably entertained by my inane ramblings. The portions were fairly large and the food was okay. I can't remember it in too much detail so I guess it wasn't anything stunning. I also have no idea whether it was as cheap as promised! (This is really bad - when writing, the closer I get to the end of the trip the less I can remember!).
We did nothing particularly hardcore that night. Probably went for a McDonald's milkshake knowing us! We had spent the day trying to decide what to do the following day. We had agreed that we would see Elisa at some point when we were in Italy, and whilst we were in Florence seemed like the obvious time. We also wanted to go and see Pisa (despite all friends and tour guides saying the same thing: it's not worth it). Elisa lives in a place called Pietrasanta, which we actually passed on the way from La Spezia to Pisa. Pisa is sort of vaguely halfway between Pietrasanta and Florence (VAGUELY). So since I was curious to see her hometown, and figuring we could go to Pisa on our way back to Florence, we agreed to catch the train back up to Pietrasanta the next day!
We got there in time for lunch, and after some slight confusion as to where to meet up we finally found Elisa! (Well, she found us!) She showed us around the centre of the town, which didn't take too long(!), and then took us back to her house where she cooked for us! Yep, we got to eat real homemade Italian food in a real Italian household! She made all sorts of great food for us to try - more than I can even remember. And it was all so so good!
Just to prove we'd been there.
After lunch we headed back to the train station and caught a train to Pisa. Elisa went to university in Pisa so she knows her way around... which was useful! As most of the guides point out, the only thing to really see in Pisa is the main square - Campo dei Miracoli. It's where the cathedral, baptistry and campanile are all situated.
And by campanile I do of course mean the Leaning Tower.
Apparently the cathedral and the baptistry are also leaning, although I couldn't really tell... I guess the lean angle isn't quite as much as for the tower!
Definitely not a lot of lean.
You can get various different tickets letting you in to each of the three main attractions - we decided that the tower was a bit pricey and also probably a long wait (only a certain number of people are allowed up at a time for obvious reasons!), so just bought tickets for the catherdral and baptistry.
Elisa was made to wear this stunning garment because her top was deemed inappropriate for church! She wasn't happy.
When we were in the baptistry one of the guide-type people did a bit of singing to show off the acoustics of the place... it was very impressive! Although it took me a while to realise she was an official person, and not just someone breaking the rules or something, heh.
Good view of the cathedral and tower from one of the windows in the battistero.
Back outside again we took the obligatory tourist photos of us holding up the Leaning Tower.
Arf.
The one of Pete came out better than the one of me, because I was too short/we weren't close enough!
Meeee and Eliiii.
Elisa showed us some of the university buildings as well as a botanical garden type area which was cool, as I doubt we would have seen either had we been on our own!
Where smart people go.
We then stopped off somewhere to get a drink - Elisa knew the student hangouts and therefore the places that were cheap, hehe.
Eventually we headed back to the station where Elisa returned home and we caught the train back to ol' Firenze.
I really like this picture.
I can't for the life of me remember what we did that evening. Although I do remember when we came out of the station, Pete spotted about eight nuns in a row and therefore was totally WHIPPING MY ASS at NunWatch. (Oh yeah, NunWatch - not really mentioned that before have I? It became something of a ritual to shout out "Nun!" whenever we saw one on our travels. We kept a tally of how many we'd each spotted and whoever had the most by the end of any particular country "won". We're so irreverent, I know. But nuns are a novel sight for us, what with the fact that I think I've only ever seen one wandering the streets in the UK!). I think we might have booked our train to Rome when we got back. Or maybe we'd already done that before we left for Pietrasanta? Hmmm... oh! I remember going to a supermarket, so I guess we just got sandwiches or something for tea. Oh yeah, it's all coming back, all coming back to me now (thanks Celine). We had a chilled night eating snacky bits from the supermarket and playing Yahtzee and Uno.
Our train to Rome was leaving at around ten the next morning, so we roused ourselves earlier, had another weird shower and packed up the rest of our things. We got to the station with loads of time to spare so had a delightfully unhealthy McD's breakfast. Finally our train came in and we were off to our very last city!
So, Florence. Given the fact that I've mentioned several times now that me and Pete are not so much for the art, I guess it might seem kind of weird for us to have stopped off at Florence. I guess it was kind of weird. Originally Florence wasn't in my plan at all, for the very reason that I thought it would just all be arty. There are various reasons it got added - it was close to Pisa, it seemed like the best place to stay if we wanted to visit Elisa, it was on the way to Rome... and I eventually realised it probably wasn't all about the art! Fortunately I was right. Whilst Florence is still an important city in the art world, it has plenty more to offer for those not so inclined. A la us. That's not to say I didn't want to go in any of the galleries. In fact, I'm always quite interested to see famous paintings (or sculptures). Given the popularity of the museums and the limit on our time though, it did mean I didn't feel disappointed when we decided against going in any. Does that make sense? Some of the buildings in Florence are art enough if you ask me! Il Duomo in particular will probably always stay with me as one of the most beautiful buildings I've ever seen. So, glad we went? Definitely. Also glad we went to Pisa... well, you can't go all that way and not visit it really, can you?! Even if it is just a square! And seeing a friend who we don't get to see very often was just a great bonus!