explore. dream. discover.: Firenze AKA Florence

Sooooooo… getting to Florence from Rome is kind of a funny story... but at the time it wasn’t. First of all, we purchased our tickets to Florence the evening before (17 euro each). The ticket woman said that we had an open ticket, but said that we could take the 9:10 train. The next morning, we were in a hurry to catch the train and so we quickly asked someone if the train was going to “Firenze” and didn’t think much about it and boarded. About an hour into our trip, a dude came to check our tickets. He was really pissy and told us that we had gotten on the wrong train—the high speed and more expensive train. He didn’t try to hear us out or empathize with us silly American girls in the least and instead yelled at us: “YOU PAY DIFFERENCE!”, which ended up being an additional 35 euro each! Ouch.

I was quite annoyed, and soon one of the other passengers, having heard what had happed to us, told us we were at our stop (way ahead of schedule). I quickly stormed of the train and Linds and I walked around asking people if anyone knew where our hostel was. About 15-20 minutes later, we were still trying to figure out where our hostel was and all of a sudden I realized I didn’t have my purse. AHHHHH. My purse—with all my cards, cash AND passport—was missing. We quickly went to the window and the guy told us to go to the other train station by hopping on a bus and talk to the customer service there.

We did just so, but when we got there, the lady was super irritated. “Why did it take you so long to get here?, there is a train that comes to this train station from the other station in five minutes.” Uhhh, well we were told to take the bus. Anyway, long story short two things: one, the people at the customer service are well-connected to the trains/conductors, two, I’m pretty sure I was touched by an angel because by around 10 pm my purse was returned to me with EVERYTHING IN IT!!!! Thank goodness!

(nerdy pic of me, upon getting my purse back)

Linds and I loved Firenze! We were there for quite a few days, because it was a bit cheaper than Rome (hostels, anyway). We enjoyed wandering the streets and eating lots of gelato and pizza.

The first night we were in Florence, it was the Rose Bowl. Of course, I had to support my team and watch the game. We were pretty lucky to have nice weather most of our trip, but this night it decided to pour and we had to walk about 20 minutes to get to the Irish Pub we went to! It was sad to see the Badgers lose :(

(Rose Bowl + some delish beer)

We spent a lot of time outside, taking in the sites...

(Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore)

(Giotto's Bell tower)

(Piazza della Repubblica)

There was a really great little leather market. Linds and I each got a purse for really great prices. You can sort of see the market in the pic below.

(making a wish at the Fontana del Porcellino. You put a coin in the boars mouth & try to make it drop into the vent below)

(Palazzo della Signoria, aka the Palazzo Vecchio)

(Sculptures in the Loggia dei Lanzi)

(one of the many replica's of the David; we didn't bother seeing the real one because there were so many sculptures...and because it was expensive to see the real one)

(we found a cute little lunch place w/ great prices! They had calzones, pizza, pasta, everything)

One awesome (and dangerous) thing that Florence has, is called “aperitivo.” Basically, a lot of American “bars” have it in the evening around dinner time. All you have to do isbuy one drink and then it’s an all-can-eat buffet. The food is from all the leftover ingredients the restaurant has from that day. The food was incredible…and what a steal!

(Aperitivo, round one...Soooooo good!)

One day we took the bus to Siena, a sight my cousin Angela and others had recommended to me. Again, the weather wasn’t the greatest and there wasn’t much to do. I would like to go back some day, but I think it would be much nicer where the weather is nicer.