The train ride was uneventful and on the advice of a tripadvisor forum, we alight at a station one after Pisa Centrale and walk a significantly shorter distance to the landmark tower for which the city is known for (we know it's shorter because we return later to Florence via Pisa Centrale)! Pisa is crowded but not ridiculous. We enter via an archway and to our right I notice a long row of market shops and comment on how lovely it is to have a market outdoors. Tim corrects my observation, pointing out that they are just dodgy souvenir shops for tourists.
We pick a shady spot behind the baptistery for lunch. We are not the only ones; with a handful of other travellers/visitors sitting on the grass enjoying the shade.
After lunch, it's time to climb the tower - unfortunately, they limit the number of people who can climb the tower by allocating time slots and the only available time is at 4:40pm. We decide against waiting around for three hours and head back to Florence to visit the Galileo Museum of Science instead.
After gawking at some amazing experimental devices and telescopes made in the 18/19th centuries that are longer than Tim is tall, the museum closes and it's time our for dinner... But not before one pit stop at the tourist-designed markets at San Lorenzo Square. The aim is to get in and out as quickly as possible with a leather jacket for me! We see three stores and decide on one, making our purchase minutes before he shut the door for the day. I believe that shop took less than 30mins - success!
We pop into the trattoria next to our hotel for dinner and order two traditional Florentine dishes - (1) Ribolitta - a vegetable soup, usually made from left overs, that are reboiled so that it looks more like a stew and has broken chunks of bread in it that have soaked up the flavoursome soup; (2) I can't recall the name of this dish, but it's basically tortellini stuffed with potato (instead of spinach and ricotta), served with a meat sauce. Both our meals are absolutely delicious.
On our last day in Florence, we visit the Uffizi Gallery (Italian for "offices" if anyone is wondering, as the building which houses the gallery, were used by the Medicis as their offices) and are thankful that we have pre-purchased our tickets. We arrive at 8:25am, right before the museum opens and there is already a line - both for people with and without prepaid tickets! We spend about an hour and a half in the gallery, seeing the key highlights and skipping the "no name" paintings as we use our Rick Steves' audio guide to learn more about what it means for a painting to be considered "renaissance" (basically the first time artists captured scenes in three dimensions).
After the Uffizi, it's on to the Accademia Gallery to see David. A much smaller gallery, we wait about 20 mins before we are allowed in with our prepaid tickets - much faster than the poor folk who have been waiting out in the sun for 2.5 hours. Moral of the story? Prebook any tickets you can!
For those who haven't seen the real David, he is larger than you might imagine. Standing 14ft tall, if you look closely, you'll notice that his head seems too large for his body. This is because Michelangelo was commissioned to carve the statue to be placed atop the duomo and made the head slightly bigger for the perspective of those looking up at him. David, of David and Goliath fame, is carved from a huge block of marble, with a farrowed brow, sling over his left shoulder, crossing his back, with the rock with which he would smite Goliath within the sling in his right hand. The amount of detail that Michelangelo has been able to unearth of David's body is stunning. The muscles and even veins in David's arms and hands are perfect. With guidance from Rick Steves, we like to think that this is David moments before he kills the giant and his eyes are saying "I can take him".
Other than David, the gallery houses some of Michelangelo's other works - the prisoners - half completed sculptures whose figures seem to be fighting to escape the marble. Apart from that, there is not much to see for those not too art inclined.
After the Accademia, we are all "arted" out. We head back to our hotel for another simple lunch of delicious bread and meats, not before stopping by the San Lorenzo markets and Tim has decided he would like a new wallet - apparently I'm not the only shopper in the family!
Our final activity for the day is an Italian cooking class. First we cook our food, then we eat it! We prepare a four course meal - a baked vegetarian appitiser made with layers of eggplant, mashed potato and cheese, a first course of baked lasagne, a second course of turkey breast cooked with mushrooms and saffron vege stock and desert...A chocolate self saucing cake.
We roll ourselves home to pack and the next morning, we are up and ready for another Italian adventure - Venice.
Tim's observations:
- One must pay a fee in many toilets throughout Europe if they wish to use the facilities. The obvious benefit of this is that the money is used to keep the toilets clean. This benefits everyone, except for those who are bursting to use the toilet and have completely run out of money...
- David is awesome, we did our best, but didn't do him justice in our description above.
- Tim finally has a wallet with a section for coins, which cost significantly less than the branded wallet Ness previously gave him (function over fashion). A potential disconnect for someone moving into Brand Management? :)
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A Florentine special - Ribolitta |
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