Florence - Video

April 7/08 - Florence, Firenze. We took a Eurostar train, first class from Florence to Rome and arrived about 1.5 hours at the Santa Maria Novella station. Bought 24 hr travel pass for Euro 5 at the train station and took a bus to our 5-star hotel, oops we mean 5-star hostel (that's the hostel's name). It is located in an old renaissance tower near the Ponte Vecchio. If you book accommodation here in Florence, make sure you ask if there is an elevator and on which floor. Too late, we found out that our hostel (more like a bed & breakfast) is located on the 3rd or 4th floor. One floor height is not the same as back home, here 3 floors looked like 5 floors height back home.
Mr. Sadek, the caretaker was great. Thinner and smaller than Wee or Eddie, he took two big luggage bags, one in each hand and ran up the stairs. The rest of us were dragging ourselves up the stairs and panting...

Florence was dusty, windy and crowded with tourists. We hated the dust. We went to the Mercato Centrale, winding through the bazaar-like (pasar malam style) area filled with leather & T-shirt stalls. In the market, we found some erotic looking pasta - great souvenir!!

Not to be missed, Piazza della Signoria, Uffizi (closed on Monday), Ponte Vecchio and the Duomo. Yes, David (a copy, not the real one) is there in his manliness, so is Neptune and and many others in their naked self. Nope, there is no leaf to cover the .........
The Dumo is magnificent, the Italians have great passions for religion and marble. The Duomo is a great marriage of these two passions. We decided to climb the tower instead of the Dome so that we can view the beautiful Dome from the tower. It is more than 400 steps to the top, well worth the climb - Florence rooftop view is superb. Of course, this is renaissance age at its best.
Back on the ground, we went searching for..., what else, gelato.....Gelato Grom was heavenly. Indeed the best, so goooood! If you are there, try the strawberry and the chocolate.
At night, we had dinner at a trattoria - Taverna de Neri, food was awesome, especially the steak and house wine.
The next day, we woke up early. Sorry Mr. Sadek - not able to stay for breakfast. We made our way to the train station, left our luggage there and headed for Pisa (checkout the log for Pisa). After Pisa, we had to return to Florence for the evening train to Venice. While having a couple of hours to kill, we walked to Grom again for some gelati.