Florence...

Our last and final adventure in Italy...mind you, not our last adventure! Life is an adventure! Besides, we do still need to fly out of this joint...and who knows how that will go! But as for our exploring and adventuring in Italy...it has come to a close. But not before I got to go to Florence! Museums are not the best places for small children, so I have been scheming for a long time how to pull off Florence for a while...Tobin (the most wonderful husband ever) agreed to watch the kids on a Saturday...so I made my reservations for Uffizi and Accademia in Florence. It was SO worth it! Case and I made the adventure together...super fun memories! Here is a pic of Ponte Vecchio...

Here is the Santa Croce Church...

Covered markets near Uffizi...

And the Boar fountain in front of it...

The Duomo...

Case filling his water bottle in front of San Lorenzo...

Not being able to go to many museums, I have hand picked the few I wanted to go to. Vatican Museums, Uffizi, and Accademia...all well worth the price of admission. Uffizi was our first stop and it has the finest collection of Italian art anywhere...period. The art was absolutely spectacular...but it was the hottest place I have ever been! I don't know why I was thinking it was going to be air conditioned but I was sorely mistaken. I didn't spend as much time just absorbing the art, as it was meant to be, but I certainly hit the high points. The most striking pieces...at least to me...were two Carravagio paintings (not in the special exhibit) of Mary and Christ as a baby. Generally speaking, those kind of paintings tend to be very 'churchy' and full of Catholic doctrine and such. But these two paintings (one with Mary with an infant Christ, and one with toddler Christ) were absolutely breathtaking. The realism, the emotion, the images are forever burned into my memory. For a good reason.

Our second stop was Accademia (Micheangelo's David). Equally breathtaking! First, it was air conditioned and a welcome relief to the heat. Second, was David...absolutely exquisite! I, for one, was unsure that it was worth going to...you already know what David looks like, everyone has seen pictures. It was SO worth it! I truly appreciate being able to go. First, the sculpture is much bigger than imagined. Second, the detail is absolutely amazing (I am running out of adjectives here). It looked like he could just get up and move around...SO realistic. And out of marble! To make it more fascinating, they had on display several unfinished works of Michealangelo...it was almost like looking at his process...how the sculpture came out of the block of marble...being able to see some of the technique in sculpting...amazing!

So overall, I liked Florence and it's museums. I am glad that I made the effort even as I am packing the last few items in our suitcases (most of those last few items came from Florence!).

Have a wonderful and cool day!
Ciao a tutti!