Bye-Bye Venice, Hello Florence

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After four magical days and nights in Venice, today we are training down to Florence in the heart of Italy. 

Michelangelo Buonarroti's "David"

While I was designing our Florence itenerary, I had to make some tough choices about what to leave out.  It seems that every single thing that was ever done in Florence, or by Florentines, or brought to Florence is simply put, incredible.

Trivia:  Did you know that Pinocchio (and his creator) was from Florence?

Highlights of Florence

• tour the Duomo (cathedral)
• crossing the Ponte Vecchio (bridge) built in 1345
• the Accademia to see Michelangelo's David
• the Uffizi museum to see Botticelli's The Birth of Venus
• the Bargello museum to see Donatello's David

(don't you just hate name droppers?)

Artists and architects, poets and engineers, musicians and philosophers seemingly burst from the Florentine womb spewing forth masterpiece after masterpiece.  I could honestly spend all summer in Florence and never get bored.

Michelangelo was a fine sculptor and painter, but in my book, Leonardo was "the man". 

It gives me chills to think I will be walking the actual streets that he walked five centuries ago.

Movie suggestions:  The daVinci Code, Much Ado About Nothing

If I haven't already been forced to buy myself an auxiliary stomach, I plan to try every "Florentine" dish I see between now and Sunday when we leave for Rome.

Hopefully, we can squeeze in a side trip to Assisi, the home of St. Francis (or San Francesco, as they say...) before plunging head-long into Rome.