Trip to Italy: Part 2

Read the first part of my Italian adventure here.

After Milan, we took the train to Florence. Because this train trip was during the day, we got to see the Italian countryside, and it's perhaps even more dramatic than that of Provence. Tiny villages peek out from between rolling mountain ranges and steep valleys all along the railway between Milan and Florence, and it's really pretty.

As soon as you leave the train station in Florence, people try to sell you all sorts of junk: "Rolex" watches, "Gucci" bags, "Dolce & Gabana" sunglasses; there are big signs throughout the city warning tourists against buying counterfeit stuff. Finding our hostel was a little tricky because it was on the tiny Volta dei Tintori, yet we could only see the larger and adjacent Corso dei Tintori on the map. But it was much closer to the center of Florence than the Milan hostel, which was convenient.

Every building in Florence is beautiful, old, and exhibits stereotypically Mediterranean architecture. It's a really gorgeous city to walk through. Unfortunately, Florence is closed on Mondays. We first tried to visit the Palazzo Pitti, but found it was open every day other than Monday. We also found that the Uffizi Gallery was shut; a nearby restaurant owner told me that Monday was a "free day" in Italy and everything is closed. Which I wish we'd known ahead of time.

Anyway, the Opera di Santa Marie del Fiore—a big cathedral in the center of Florence—was open so we looked around. It, like the Duomo du Milano, is an enormous building and looks spectacular on the inside. This time, we were allowed to take pictures, although they don't really convey the sense of scale. The Opera was far smaller than the Duomo, but still ornately finished with an elaborate painting on the ceiling of its dome. Of course, the most intriguing aspect of the Opera was that you can climb its tower, called Giotto's Campanile. Now, the sign at the bottom warned that there were 414 steps to the top, but that didn't deter us. Note to self: climbing 414 concrete steps takes a serious toll on your knees and thighs.

There are two landings partway up the tower, yet the view from them doesn't compare to the spectacular panorama from the top, some 278 feet above Florence. As far as the eye can see are the tiled roofs, until they give way to the mountains that surround Florence. It's also notable from the top how the long, straight streets fan out from the center of the city. Click the image below for a larger view.



Given that so much was closed, we spent a lot of time wandering around Florence, which is a great town and looks very much how you'd expect an old Italian town to look. We did manage to get to the Uffizi Gallery when it was open, although they were performing renovations and had closed big portions of the museum. What was still open seemed really poorly organized: some large rooms would hold a few, uninteresting works, whilst small rooms held numerous, famous works. Hence you always had to push through crowds to see things.

Because the two towns are so close and Europe has a good understanding of public transport, we took a train to Pisa for the afternoon. Even though it's about 60 miles from Florence, return tickets were only €10 each! Once again, we were offered all sorts of knockoff watches and sunglasses. Pisa is actually a pretty town, although I hadn't realized that the leaning tower is part of the town. For some reason, I had visions of it being set in a large, empty field. Instead, the tower has buildings all around; it's hard to stand far enough back to get a picture of it, and you don't really see the effect of the 4º lean without the horizon as a point of reference. Still, I'm glad I went to see it. I'll admit, though, that I left feeling like when I saw Niagara Falls: it's the sort of thing you see once, but don't really need to visit again. Having seen the tower and how much it leans, I probably wouldn't rush back.