Nov 7 Day 34 Spending the Day in Florence with a New Friend

My new Italian friend, Maria Vincenza, drove from Sansepolcro to spend the day with me in Florence.  We had a great time, despite the monsoon, and she showed me lots of fun places to shop, eat, and visit.

We had coffee at Rivoire Pasticceria, on the Piazza della Signoria, walked to two famous restaurants which were both closed (!) and ended up at one of her favorite places anyway, Li Giubbe Rosse, on the Piazza della Repubblica, where we had a delicious lunch (steak for her, swordfish carpaccio for me) in a tent with the rain pouring down.

Naturally, we just happened to sit next to the manager of the restaurant, Erasmus (?) and his friend Fabrizio, who were very nice and talked to us the whole time.
Guess which one of us is not Italian.  Not too difficult to figure out.

I also was able to fit in a couple of touristy things today as well.

The Baptistry, across from the Duomo and the bell tower, is absolutely gorgeous, and it is where a lot of baptisms took place (including Dante's).  The famous "Gates of Paradise" doors are inside the Duomo Museum (except that now they are being restored) and in their place on the Baptistry are replicas.  The building is octagonal and has gorgeous marble columns inside.  The ceiling is covered in mosaics of religious stories and my neck hurt after gazing up with my mouth wide open for so long.

Here you can see part of the doors as well as get a sense of the interesting design of the Baptistry.

The other visit was to the remarkable Museum of the Palazzo Vecchio (open until midnight, which is past my convent curfew).

This building is, in part, a tribute to the governing Medici family, and between the paintings, frescoes, wooden carvings, inlaid doors (Dante and Petrarch), statues, furniture, and sheer size of the palace, it is overwhelming.  (I am beginning to sound like a broken record about this city being "overwhelming").

It is astounding to see the great detail of the rooms, especially the ceilings and its portrayal of Christian religious stories and Roman gods and goddesses.  It was interesting to recognize some of them - like Apollo, Diana, and Electra - and to see all the little Putti (little boys who look like cherubs without the wings).  There is an entire drawing room devoted to the Sabine women (those that the Romans forcefully took as their "wives").  There is also a lot of attention paid to Elianora.

This is one of several massive tapestries of the Joseph stories, this one showing Joseph forgiving his brothers.  It took lots of people over 20 years to restore these tapestries and they are amazing.

Better than Clooney...




All in all, another great day in Italy.