Way back in March 2020, as the world closed up, we were supposed to go Florence for two months. This was a dream of mine and the Daughter, and was eagerly awaited. Then we had to cancel it – tears were shed – but we knew it was the right thing to do. Fast forward a couple of years, and we are finally going to Italy. One day the Husband asked me if I wanted to go to Florence for Thanksgiving weekend. Duh, yes. But it was laced with guilt and sadness that the Daughter would not be with us.
Florence. Oh man…it was everything I had hoped it would be and more. And the Husband admitted that he really liked it too💞So I shall begin at the beginning…
Thus far, Italian trains are two thumbs up. It was pretty interesting though that most of the leg from Bologna to Florence (on the Frecciarossa – high speed train) was underground. It would keep people/animals and everything else off of the tracks! Once at Florence SMN (Santa Maria Novella – the main station) we followed the crowd. The walk into the medieval section is flat and easy and only took about ten minutes. Finding our B&B was slightly more challenging, but again, not difficult. We really liked the place we stayed at (Residenza Giotto), plus the hosts were incredibly helpful. Another excellent Rick Steves recommendation! We even had an amazing view of the Duomo from our room. Speaking of Duomo, I could not wait to be standing at the foot of it, so off we went. My view was accompanied by taking a photo so I could share that moment with the Daughter. I was missing her terribly right then.
We joined the not too long queue to see the inside of the Duomo. It is mostly a case of the frosting looking amazing but the cake is not quite what it should be. It’s pretty, but that’s it. The inside of the dome is spectacular, but we would get a better view of it in just a little bit. As has been the case in many other places, the late 1800s people had a firm idea of what medieval should look like. And, during that time period, it was decided that the Duomo didn’t look medieval enough. Now it looks bland inside. Oh well, the outside more than makes up for it. And the dome itself…😁
There are over 450 stairs from the ground level to the cupola level of the dome (that small white bit on the very top). Some are reasonable stairs. A lot are circular, castle style steps (the treads themselves have been replaced over the centuries, but the arrangement hasn’t changed). Then you get higher, into the dome itself- you are between the inner and outer walls of the dome – and the stairs begin to get interesting. Steep, strangely arranged, low roof. But you can see the brick herringbone pattern that holds the dome up! I won’t go into the history of the dome here (I know, gasp!) but it was a super big deal in the 1400s. Still a big deal. If you are interested in the story I highly recommend Brunelleschi’s Dome by Ross King, fascinating and well written. Anyway, so there we are, gasping for air (it’s quite the workout. Even more so in a mask), but at the very top!
After spending a bit of time enjoying the view and a sense of accomplishment we headed back down to the lower dome for a close up look at the amazing art painted on the inside. Brunelleschi had envisioned the interior of the dome to be covered in gold mosaics. I’m sure this would have been a spectacular sight! But, Brunelleschi died (and not surprisingly is buried in the cathedral) so the interior of the dome was painted white and stayed that way for about 100 years until an artist was hired to paint it (Vasari, followed by Zuccari) with frescoes of the Last Judgement. It is spectacular.
We had time to come back down the hundreds of thousands of stairs, have a quick gelato for energy…and climb part of the way back up! Rarely, very rarely are the terraces (the flat walkway around the main roof area of the cathedral) open to the public. One lady told us this was her sixth trip to Florence – and she had never seen the terraces available to tour before. It was super cool – but most definitely not for those with height issues, as there are areas you are squeezing through with not much more than a railing between you and the very hard ground. Okay, none of what we did is for those with height issues!
I must admit that every step we had to go up or down was met with complaints after this.
Our excursion on Friday meant that I could move another life long longing, eagerly awaited museum to the visited list. Yes, I have a museum list. I’m such a geek. The Uffizi Gallery. Sigh of happiness. My all time favorite painting (Birth of Venus) is there, but it might have some competition now!
After the Uffizi we went to the Husband’s museum choice, Galileo. Because he is a science and technology geek. I had to admit, it was pretty darn cool too. Especially seeing Galileo’s own tools and equipment. So glad someone had the foresight to hold on to them!
I had no intention of wasting a single minute of our time in Florence! As soon as we were done with the Galileo museum we were off to Santa Croce. We had several people tell us this is their favorite church in Florence. We wholeheartedly agreed – until we went to San Miniato – but I will get to that. We even got to wander around the Christmas market set up in front of Santa Croce. We tried to do our part to support some of the vendors😁 The church itself is amazing, but not overwhelming, there is an intimacy about it. It also contains the graves of two very important people: Michelangelo and Galileo.
I promise I am really trying to just sum up what we did and what we saw. I could do a post on each day’s activities, but I know I wouldn’t get it done! So I am trying to put the most interesting (to me!) stuff in.
Saturday’s plan was to climb one of the hills surrounding Florence. There was a church up there that I wanted to see – isn’t there always a church I want to see????? I don’t think the hill has a name – if it does, I can’t find it. But it’s the hill that Piazzale Michelangelo is on. The views! Ah, gorgeous. We were headed for San Miniato al Monte, an active monastery on the top of the hill. It did not disappoint at all. And, if you find yourself there, be certain to visit the gift shop. They have some beautiful things in there and it is run by the monks. This ended up being our favorite of all the churches we saw in Florence. For more information (and better photos) see https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_di_San_Miniato_al_Monte.
We did a lot of just wandering the streets and taking in where we were, which led us to some wonderful sights. My favorite though is when we figured out that Sandro Botticelli was buried in Florence. We found the church tucked into a neighborhood but it was late in the day and the doors were closed. It was raining and I almost burst into tears. We walked around the corner to see if there was another way in – no luck. As I walked back around the corner though…the doors were open!!! YAY!! The church was beautiful and contained a painting by Botticelli. There was another person buried there who took us completely by surprise – a name I hadn’t thought of since high school history – Amerigo Vespucci. Wow. The church was once under the sponsorship of the Vespucci family. If you don’t remember who he is: America was named for him.
I’m going to wrap this up with some photos from our last day when we explored the Boboli Gardens and some of my other favorite things in Florence – I’ve got to end this at some point!
