(April 13, 2014)

Our day began with a tour of the Uffizi Museum from Context Travel. As usual, our guide was knowledgable and interesting, full of lesser-known facts about everything we saw. She started us in the plaza outside the Uffizi, with the trio of well-known statues in the Loggia. Cellini’s Perseus and the Medusa, Giambologna’s Rape of the Sabine Women, and Fedi’s Rape of Polyxena are a disturbing group of statues that are nonetheless beautiful and striking.

She then went into a history of the gallery (basically: many thanks to the Medici Family!) and inside we went.

SADLY there are no pictures allowed once we were in the museum. I was able to get a good shot of the Ponte Vecchio, however.

This was a long tour, and we were a bit tired afterwards. But we went to the museum’s cafe, had lunch, and then basically went back through again. It was pretty crowded, but we persevered, and saw all the things the tour didn’t have time for: more Caravaggio’s, Botticelli’s, Raphael’s, Michelangelo’s . . .  more more MORE! Some specific paintings we remember are: Lippi’s Madonna and Child, Botticelli’s Primavera and Birth of Venus, da Vinci’s Adoration of the Magi and Annunciation, Raphael’s Tondo, and Caravaggio’s Medusa and Bacchus.  Bottom line: this museum is a must for art lovers and we are so very glad we went through it again.

Back in the piazza, we studied Donatello’s Judith of Holofernes, and Ammanati’s fountain of Neptune.

Dinner that evening was at Angiolino, over on the other side of the river, and a perfect walk. A small place, they nonetheless had a menu in English and was one of the better meals we had in Italy.