Florentine Splendor...

I love this city - in contrast to Naples and Rome, Florence has grace.
It has a smallish feel to it, an aura of sophistication, and the men are pleasantly charming.

The Arno River runs right through Florence, and the numerous bridges that cross it are perfect places for swinging your legs over the edge and relaxing with lunch.




The Ponte Vecchio is lined with shops, which is less Italian than it is medieval (most references date it as 14th century, but there was a bridge here as early as the 10th century).




I took a few side trips, the first of which was Siena:





This is the coolest sandwich shop ever - see the boar's head by the doorway?


One of many entries into the main town square...


...which was a hell of a lot bigger than I expected.



And of course, the streets were lovely, with plenty of little alleys to duck into when the clamouring and jostling of the tourist-collective got too aggravating.


I also went to Greve-in-Chianti, where I sampled $150 Chianti (exquisite, I'm ruined for life now) as well as a few different olive oils (truffle oil is where it's at, people). If only the balsamic had been available for sampling...

As for cultural stuff, the Science Museum was so interesting - there was an entire exhibit on Galileo that captured my attention for almost two hours.

Outside the museum, there is a sundial indicating the true solar time of day and the period of the year:


The rest of museum was filled with instruments and mechanisms and tools like this:


Yup, that's Galileo's right index finger. Of all the things...


Galileo created a complete moveable 'map' of the constellations, planets and stars known at the time so that you could chart the sky based on any position and any time of year.


The Uffizi gallery was a jumble of artworks and frustrating didactic paths (it is impossible to exit any major museum in Europe without passing through at least one gift shop).

Most memorable was Botticelli's Spring and Birth of Venus, and these statues carved out of different types of stone, with amazing detail and beautiful natural patterns.


The Duomo was actually more impressive from the outside - probably the most interesting and gorgeous facade I've seen yet.




Inside it was massive and felt rather empty...but still beautiful.



I like their votive arrangement:


So, the Academia gallery, and the ubiquitous David.

When whoever-it-was said that after seeing Michelangelo's David, one needn't see any other works of sculpture, he was right. It's absolutely perfect.

The muscles, the tendons, the viens. If you stare at it long enough, it starts to look like it's breathing. I was very sneaky-sneaky, and snapped a few photos from behind a pillar.




Incredible.

The museum guard posted near Michelangelo's Prisoners was far more adept at his job than those watching the David, so I was unable to get any photos. A description will have to suffice:

The statue's taut and swollen neck muscles and the arm straining forcefully towards the rear as if to check the forward movement of the figure's bent leg are immediately evident in the statue and express the contrast between matter and idea, between finite and infinite in Michelangelo and the incarnation of the interior torment that envelops the human soul.

Alright then.

So, I've been backpacking for 2 months now, and I didn't realize how much I miss good conversation until I met this cool Californian in Florence - questions and answers, monologue and dialogue, simply listening to someone else's thoughts and ideas. After communicating in broken english so often, it's actually rejuvenating to hold a conversation unrestricted by language barriers. Somehow, it brings you back to yourself.

We went to a sushi restaurant - deciphering an italian sushi menu is much more fun than you might think - which satisfied a craving three months in the making (unripened avocado and no tobiko, but still).

In fact, food nostalgia was a recurring conversational theme.
My top three most-missed foods are pumpernickel bread, montreal bagels, and I don't even want to consider what I would do for a mango smoothie right now.

Indulge me for a moment while I wax-romantic on supermarkets: I love grocery shopping in my own country, and I have to say, there is a certain...shall we say ecstatic joy to be had in (finally) finding a large supermarket with more than one isle and more than one choice for each product. Now I'm all for the little corner shops for day to day needs, but nothing can compare to the consumer cornucopia offered by the larger stores. So satisfying yet so fleeting...


Overall, I loved being in Florence for ten days.

I'm leaving with distinct memories and impressions: someone whistles sharply on a side street and 15 inquiring heads pop out of second, third, fourth floor windows; how packed the markets are in the early morning - a chorus of buongiorno's and the aroma of espresso.

The other day, when I asked for a wine recommendation, the shop keeper said "I don't recommend wine for women - they get drinking and start to touching me." He laughs as he twirls around patting his chest and hips in mock demonstration. I replied "you're lucky you're safe behind that counter, I've already had a few."
His eyes shone as he passed me a bottle, at a discounted price ;-)

It also gave me time to return to certain streets, markets, shops and cafes; to be remembered and greeted as a patron rather than a tourist. This was one of my favourite patios.


So postcard-y I know but I absoluetly love this picture. The whole street leading down to this archway was lined with colorful doorways and draped with vines.


Mark my words, I will come back to Florence.
You can come for a visit at my rural villa, and we'll go for a spin on my little motorbike, then we'll open a few bottles of Chianti and watch the sunset over the Tuscan hills.