So by Tuesday, 7/20, a week after we arrived in Europe, we were pretty exhausted. The heat and constant physical strain were way more taxing than we had anticipated, and we almost skipped this lovely side trip to Florence. But, oh, we were so glad we didn't!
When we first got off the train, we were greeted by the sight of the lovely Basilica di Santa Maria Novella. This is not to be confused with the Chiesa di Santa Maria della Salute in Venice, or the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. Are you figuring out that Santa Maria has a lot of churches?
This particular one was interesting because of it's unique, and, admittedly, totally wacky architecture. You can't really tell from this pictures, but apparently the first part of the church was built in the 10th century. The last addition was finished toward the end of the 15th; and, go figure, style changed a little bit in those 500 years or so, and so everything is totally mismatched. It's pretty eclectic and I like that. It's also filled with old Italian art... I didn't like that so much. Don't get me wrong, there was a lot of fresco work that included really incredible detail, and that's certainly something to be admired; but there were also some really disturbing pieces that depicted some pretty vile things and they kind of gave me the heebie jeebies. But maybe I just don't understand art? Anyway, we were pretty glad to get out of there.
After leaving Santa Maria della Salute and tracking down the biggest bottle of water we could find, we stumbled around until we found the market, which was uber-cool.
I hope you appreciate that I spared you the pictures of raw meat hanging around (though I should point out that it was extremely sanitary compared to similar markets in Mexico).
We also appreciated the live music...
And, Eric's favorite, the "Il Padrino" shirts that were for sale everywhere.
The highlight of our day was visiting the Duomo...
And climbing up it's 150 meter dome.
150 meters doesn't sound like a lot, right? At least I didn't think so. My friend, let me tell you, those were the most grueling 400-some-odd steps of my life. The staircase was akin to those you see in fairy-tale depictions where the princess is locked away in the top of a castle that is guarded by a dragon. It wound and it curved and then it wound some more. And just when you saw the light of the sun, an experience you were beginning to doubt would ever happen again, you realized you had to climb a ladder up another 50 feet. Whoever designed the Duomo was NOT looking ahead to the 21st century. Nevertheless, the view was worth it, and if I had it to do over again, I would.
We finished the day off with a walk down the Arno River...
And a visit to the Accademia where Michaelangelo's David is kept. Sadly, we were not allowed to bring our camera in to see David. But it probably wouldn't be very proper to post pictures of him on the blog anyway (for obvious reasons). We were definitely shocked by the massiveness of the statue, though. It was at least 15-20 feet high before they put it on a pedestal, and now it's 5-6 feet taller than that. My eyeballs looked directly at his feet. How Michaelangelo managed to carve that sucker without modern machinery is a mystery to me!
After seeing David, we returned to Bologna in time for an evening meal and gelato. Then we spent Wednesday recuperating from our week of Italian fun before heading on the rest of our journey. I say recuperating... I actually spent the day washing clothes in the bathroom sink and then attempting to dry them with a hair drier that was possibly as old as David himself. And I ended up staying up until around 3 the next morning doing just that. But that's one part of the trip I don't want to revisit!
Wow, it looks like I may have to extend the Europe blog to just one more post.... are you utterly bored yet? I hope not, because there's more to come soon! Be sure to check back! :-)
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