florence

1080p from Jodi Anderson on Vimeo.

click on the 1080p for the best picture

after venice we went back to bologna to stay with ryan's brother and his wife for the last night.  early the next morning ryan and i headed back on the train to florence!  we arrived in florence before 9 in the morning.  went straight to our hotel to drop off our luggage and began touring!  we fell in love with florence.  it is such a charming city (and the shopping is wonderful)!  we first purchased our florence card.  this card allowed access to all the museums without a reservation (we never had to wait in line, with the pass we walked straight in-that's the way to do it).  after getting our pass we went to the uffizi gallery.  before going to italy we downloaded all of rick steves' audio guides.  they were wonderful to listen to and he took you straight to the important stuff!  in the gallery we listened and learned from rick. then we headed straight for the david.  the line was about 4 blocks long!  but, with our florence card we got right in!  we couldn't take pictures inside, but it was amazing.  then we headed to the duomo.  i can't believe some of these churches they built so long ago!  they are absolutely beautiful.  we walked the 600 something steps to the top of the dome.  i snapped a few pictures of ryan (i stayed close to the building, i swear it was swaying a little).  then we headed over to the old bridge.  after we looked around at the shops and the river we headed to a sandwich shop.  it was so good!  then we went to check in to our hotel and rest for a bit.

then we headed out to the pitti palace and boboli gardens.  this was probably one of our favorite sites.  the gardens were so beautiful and huge!  we stayed there for awhile.  then we rented some bikes and rode around florence.  after our bike ride we found the best pizza place ever for dinner.  then we walked around the charming streets and went to the accademia gallery.  before we headed to bed we got some gelato and hung out in the piazza!  the next morning we were off to rome...

in italy the don't call diet coke, diet coke.  they call it coca light.  and when you order drinks they always come out in a glass bottle.  every coca light ryan ordered, it came out in a glass jar.  they don't have fountain drinks or tap water to order.  you get a fancy glass bottle of water.  it was fun seeing all the glass bottles on our table!