Saturday, October 9, 2010

We got an early start to as there were many things we wanted to do today. So after an ok breakfast (not as good as the breakfast in Rome, but you can't complain too much about a complimentary breakfast), we walked over to the Galleria dell'Accademia to see Michaelangelo's statue of David. It really is amazing! There are also quite a few other statues, paintings and the Di Medici collection of Strativarious violins. We then walked to the Duomo (the famous church in Florence you can see from almos anywhere in the city). After looking around at the carved doors and marble statuary, we walked to the marketplace near the Ponte Vecchio. Florence is famous for leather goods, handmade paper and gold jewelry. It was fun looking around at all the vendors. We each bought a few things and a few gifts, then went to the Uffizzi Galleria (by appt only so we quickly made reservations in the morning for the afternoon . The Uffizzi houses many art pieces (paintings and statues) that were collected centuries ago by the Di Medici family. There are a great number of Botticelli paintings hanging there. After we got "cultured", we walked to the Ponte Vecchio (which means old bridge) to look at jewelry. While everything was beautiful, nothing said "buy me April"! After that, it was off to dinner at Cafe Concerto, which was in the Piazza Michael and I stayed at ten years ago when I took cooking lessons outside Florence. I remembered quite a few stores, etc walking around there. A nice surprise! The restaurant had live music starting just as we were leaving so we listened for a while. The Italians seem to have a fascination with American rock and roll! Very interesting, lol! Afterwards us girls rode on a carosel that was set up in the Piazza-just like kids! We laughed so hard and had a grand time! Then it was back to the hotel. We leave in the morning for Torino and the start of our cooking class. Hard to believe!