FLORENCE:
Florence is a spectacularly beautiful Tuscan city.
We almost missed our connecting flight to Florence from Rome because our flight from Istanbul departed an hour late and we only had an hour layover but thankfully we picked up an extra hour due to time zone change so we made the connection with seconds to spare. We were running through the airport like lunatics pretending to be contestants on the Amazing Race. Turns out they had held the connecting flight just for us because we had made such a big hooplah back in Rome about missing our connection - sometimes making a fuss pays off (even if everyone on the flight gave us death glares as we walked on 30 minutes after they all had boarded).
Italian food is glorious. I don't understand why all food everywhere doesn't taste this good. If all the restaurants in an entire country can consistently produce food as delicious as we tasted everywhere in Italy, then why can't the rest of the world too? They should share their recipes at the next United Nations meeting.
Florence is situated on either side of the Arno River and is a port city. We never saw a drop of rain the whole perfectly temperate week.
Our hostel was a short walk from the Duomo in Florence which has the most beautiful exterior of any Church I've seen thus far.
Florence is known for it's ceramics and is adorned with beautiful painted ceramic works.
Many of the sculptures are breathtaking from afar but up close the animals faces are always so strange. There is a specific dog and dolphin with scary faces we kept seeing everywhere.
Florence has so many gardens I didn't know what to do with myself! The gardens are what make Florence my favorite part about my travels through Italy. Lush green trees with bold colored flowers and well groomed bush pathways made me feel like I was in Pride & Prejudice.
I kept trying to imagine what it would be like to live in a place as beautiful as Florence all the time... I imagine I would be broke.
I have a fascination with doors. My favorite things to observe when traveling are the different types of trees, doors, and antique shops. We stumbled upon this door walking back to our hostel one afternoon, turns out it is the main entrance to the Santa Maria Novella Church. I really wanted a picture in the doorway but there was a tourist guy already standing there talking on his cell phone and didn't seem to be moving anytime soon. So we did the photo shoot with him. I never know how to pose when I am solo in a picture so since he was on his phone, I pretended to be on one too. Upon further examination of the photograph you can notice that he is watching me as all of this happens.
Lets see... what else happened in Florence?
My friend Caroline got confronted by the Italian Police because she was laying on the ground when we were taking a break from walking. We found a lovely piazza where a street performer was playing the guitar so we sat down to watch and eat gelato and bask in the sun for a bit. Well Caroline got a little too comfortable and laid completely down on the ground... and as we found out it is against the law to sleep on the streets in Italy. Probably for the best.
Also, I bought a super wicked embroidered jacket from a vintage shop downtown from this loony old lady whose shop could have made an appearance on the show Hoarders. It still had the original tags on it and I got her to drop the price 10 Euro (which can be converted as 20 Lira - SCORE). When we got back to the hostel I looked up the brand, Roberto C, to see how much the jacket was really worth but all I could online was about Roberto Cavalli, the famous high fashion designer from Florence Italy. I knew my jacket wasn't a real Roberto Cavalli piece because the label didn't have his full name but I couldn't find out anything further until I read an article about a lawsuit between Roberto Cavalli and the brand Roberto C. Apparently the brand of my jacket is being sued by the real Roberto Cavalli for stealing their name. The results of the lawsuit have not been determined yet but it at least helped me find out that the jacket was designed and made right there in Florence, Italy!
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