Florence - shop till you drop
10/15 - Capitalism
Today in Florence, we decided to stimulate the local economy. After a quick cafe breakfast, we stopped in to a few local antique shops on the hunt for a new watch for me. Alas, we struck out at each of the spots we checked out, but with our eyes on the prize we prepared to shop for one again in Rome. We headed to the Scuola del Cuoio (school of leather) for wallets and belts, as one does in Florence, and after a very successful shopping trip we found a hole in the wall food spot between two of the main roads. Florence was very busy on the main streets that were frequented by walking tour groups, but as soon as you got one or two streets off of these established paths the city seemed to quiet down and become a bit more enjoyable. Our small in-between two streets lunch was delicious, and we notched two more spritzes for our tally.
Afterwards, we headed back to Ponte Vecchio to reaffirm that yes, the ring that Ariel had seen in a store there was what she wanted, and then on to a TikTok influenced find for a charm necklace. In fact, I ended up spending more on non-TikTok influenced purchases here than Ariel did (on a pair of brass and silver rings). Afterwards, we headed to the Pitti Palace and explored their dresses and costume museum, semi-modern art museum, the treasury, and the gardens. The treasury had a series of rooms dedicated to each of the Roman gods - but, the real highlight was the gardens. Absolutely sprawling, absolutely gorgeous. The statue of Neptune, as well as the panoramic views of both the main city and the countryside behind the city, were very impressive.
Once we were kicked out of the gardens at closing time, we strolled down to the old downtown below the Piazza Michelangelo for our dinner. We stopped in to Bookique for an aperitivo (tallying a few more spritzes) and then to I Tanocchi for a pizzeria dinner. Finally, we walked back (via Vivoli) for some gelato before finally reaching our hotel and preemptively packing up our room for our departure the next day.
10/16 - Mosaics, and Manarola
After checking out in the morning, we snagged a quick meal at another small corner cafe. The croissants with “cereal” (whole wheat) and honey have definitely become a recurring favorite. We posted up on the steps of a building outside of the archeological museum to chow down, then headed to a museum dedicated to Florentine mosaic art. This was probably one of the more impressive museums that we’ve visited all trip - after meticulously carving every individual slice of stone, artists would glue together the pieces into impressive recreations of paintings (or original works for some pieces). The resulting creations were incredibly impressive.
When we had seen the whole museum, we headed back to our hotel to collect our baggage and boarded the train for Manarola. After an uneventful few hours, we arrived in the single rainiest moment of the whole day and trudged up to our room in a torrential downpour, guided by the very helpful YouTube video that our host had provided. After managing to unlock the doors, we settled into run a quick load of laundry, dry out our pants and luggage, and get ready for dinner in town.
We stopped on our walk down to get reservations at a fairly well known local spot in Manarola, and then arrive at our reservation for a round of aperitivo seafood plates and some pasta. All delicious, as everything in Italy has been. And so, we arrived in Cinque Terre (in a rainstorm, under an “orange” weather alert). The orange weather alert caused us to need to pivot a bit on our hiking plans - under this level of alert, most hiking trails are closed and their use is discouraged, so we instead decided to spend the next day going from town to town in Cinque Terre seeing as many of the towns as we could.
Stats
Spritzes drunk: 7
Espresso shots consumed: 20
Gelato scoops consumed: 9
Liters of wine drunk: 4
Cats seen: One! One cat in Cinque Terre, our first one of the whole trip. A little black cat that darted across our path during the rain storm on the way down to dinner.