11:30 AM Arrived in Florence from Naples. This is a late addition to the itinerary that Lisa came up with for John’s 50th. Originally we were going to spend 5 days in Pompei, using it as a hub to visit all the ruins in the area. This was, in fact, John’s original pie-in-the-sky suggestion. However, there was news that percolated up about a “once-in-a-lifetime” exhibition of Donatello’s work in Florence, particularly his sculpture. Two different museums were involved in displaying pieces on loan from around the world. Not that John knows diddlysquat about Donatello, but one of his long term goals is to study art history and this seemed like an ideal excuse excellent educational opportunity available in Florence. So, Lisa (being in love with the goofus) arranged a day-trip(!) to see the exhibition. And here we are. Anyway, we had a little time so we sat across from the Duomo and had a light lunch.

Short aside: the very idea of having a meal across from a world class cultural icon that is in no way on our agenda and is simply a backdrop for lunch sums up an aspect of our new life. The shift from “this is the trip to Italy, how much can we pack in?” to “meh, day trip to Florence, why not?” is still a little surreal to us, but we’d be lying if we said we weren’t enjoying the surrealism.

12:30 PM 1st leg of the exhibition at the National Museum of the Bargello. The Bargello is a converted castle-like object (CLO) that now houses a fairly eclectic collection. Truth be told, I’m not sure that they’d otherwise have made the cut for being 1/2 of this exhibition, except that they already were the home of some key pieces by Donatello. In John’s mind, how it went down is that the other museum asked to borrow their prized Donatellos for the exhibition and the folks at the Bargello said “bugger that, put our name on the flyer” only in Italian. That said, it was an incredibly educational exhibition. The highlight was a very simple bas relief (John’s word, there was some other fancy term for it) of the Madonna and Child from 1420. Now if we had walked past it in a regular exhibition we would have thought “huh, nice Jesus art” and moved on to the next Jesus art. (If you go to a lot of museums you get a lot of Jesus art. I don’t care what your faith is, it can get old after awhile.) But in this exhibition they went to great lengths to explain that this was, in fact, the first time that these subjects had been portrayed simply looking at one another without regard for the viewer. Strange to think about, but it’s kinda like how the Matrix was only ground-breaking in the context of its time; there’s been a thousand Matrixes since then. Anyway, they then showed examples of other great masters of later times (e.g. the other three Turtles) having sought out this piece and sketched it into their notes for inspiration. It’s one thing to say “Donatello was an inspiration to later masters of the Renaissance” but this exhibition had, as the kids say, the receipts. They did a great job with that in several instances. We can’t recap the whole thing piece-by-piece, but it was very thoughtfully done.

1:30 PM Took a break at a different cafe across from a different, shade-bearing side of the Duomo and had drinks. We thought through our options for the day and decided that if we could get in to the 2nd museum earlier than our timed-entrance tickets allowed for we might try to get an earlier train back to Naples, so as not to be up so late. For we are old.

Another short aside: more and more we are realizing that things like non-refundable tickets to save a few bucks are turning out to be bad ideas. We are just getting more and more comfortable with making changes at the last minute, and hamstringing ourselves with that kind of ticket is turning out to be a pain in the patootie.

2:30 PM 2nd leg of the exhibition, at the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi. We do indeed get admitted an hour+ early. We are mildly shamed to admit that, rather than requesting to be allowed early entry, we simply presented our tickets and leaned into the language barrier. Sure enough, the look on the attendant’s face clearly said “I don’t want to have to explain to these yokels that their tickets are for a later time, they’re probably Americans and will lose their shit, sooo” and waved us in. This leg of the exhibition is more robust, with a broader cross-section of Donatello’s work. It is certainly true that a person can go a bit snow-blind at an exhibition like this, and maybe in a different world we’d have stayed another day and split it up. Still, it was a hell of an experience.

3:30 PM We finished up with the exhibition at the Palazzo Strozzi, then made our way to the train station. We had looked it up ahead of time, we were certain that there were definitely several options for earlier trains that we could take. Oops. Remember our little aside, above, about the non-refundable tickets? Yeah, that’s the kind we had: Non-refundable, non-transferable tickets. It was certainly possible for us to eat the old tickets and just buy new ones, but … well, big financial talks are for another time, but setting fire to money like that isn’t a habit we wanted to get into. So, we decided to stick to our original train.

4:30 PM Thwarted in our attempt to head home early, we now confronted a four-hour wait. This normally wouldn’t be so bad (“oh no, 4 extra hours in Florence!”) but quite frankly we were tired. It had been a lot of walking up and down stairs for the exhibitions themselves, and getting around the city just added to it. You know how people say that making your dog do mentally stimulating games and tasks can be just as tiring as going for a long run? Well, woof woof. Plus, trying to get into anywhere interesting at 5 PM with no advance ticket purchases would mean standing in line with, it seemed, the entirety of Italy’s high school senior classes. Eyugh. And so, we wandered until we found a likely looking spot and nestled in at Osteria La Scala. And by “found a spot” we mean “were thwarted in entering several restaurants that claimed to be open but absolutely were not.” It was one last stretch of walking, we were well and truly pooped as we sat down.

5:30 PM We grazed lazily trough the menu. With time to loll, our conversation drifted far and wide. We talked about our favorite Italian cities and how Naples definitely isn’t one of them. We concluded that if you set Venice aside (John said “non-theme park, regular cities”, the party pooper) that Florence probably had the best vibe to it of the places we’d been. Granted we really our neophytes in the grand scheme of thing so it is far from an exhaustive list for us to choose from. Darn, more research to be done.

6:30 PM As we wound down dinner we happened to struck up conversations with other diners who recognized that we were speaking English. We met a lovely couple from up-state New York who made the mistake of asking us about our move to Portugal. As has always been true, if you stick a dime in John he will play. And he plllaaaaaayed and played. We think we actually learned things about how we felt that even we didn’t know. This was the second time in about a month that we inadvertently became tremendous advocates for immigrating to Portugal. Who’da thunk?

7:30 PM We moved to a different restaurant because, even with the famous European sensibility of taking all the time you want for your meals, we felt guilty about tying up a table so long for a fairly modest check. The next place was also very nice, and John decided he had enough evidence to conclude that his “swing a cat, hit a good Italian restaurant” theory had been proven. In brief: no matter how “touristy” a restaurant may appear – in a heavily-trafficked tourist zone, on a main avenue, with barkers handing out flyers, and signage in English – almost all restaurants in Italy are still the result of individuals who want to own a restaurant. Very few chains exist, and those are pretty easily identified. As a result, even the places with barkers and/or (gulp) pictures on the menu can and will serve up a lovely meal upon request.

8:30 PM We were briefly, but extremely, dismayed by a posted delay to our train’s departure time, but soon enough we board our train and head back to Naples. The ride back was quiet, and other than getting completely screwed at the taxi stand at the Naples train station (seriously, f#@& that place) we make it back into our bed with no drama. And thus our whirlwind day trip to Florence came to a close, as does this post. See you next time when we wrap up our trip.

(April 15, 2014)

We tried something new today and took our breakfast ‘to go’, enjoying the pastry and the on the banks of the river Arno as we walked to the Pitti Palace. We arrived soon after they opened, around 8:30 am, and had the place pretty much to ourselves for most of the time.

Another place I couldn’t take pictures, the Pitti Palace was the home of the Medici family starting in 1549 and is basically a huge treasure-house of paintings, jewelry, sculptures, and the most luxurious of possessions. (To give you and idea of how big it is, to see all of the museums it contains, they recommend a pass that gives you unlimited access for three days.) It looks more like a fortress than a house on the outside, but the interior is amazing. We did a bit of prep work and decided to focus on two areas: the Palatine Gallery and the Boboli Gardens.

The Gallery contains more than 500 Renaissance paintings by Raphael, Titian, Lippi, and Rubens (to name a few) in 28 rooms. Each room in the gallery has a ceiling with a gorgeous fresco — these images provide the names of the rooms. I wish I could share the pictures I would have taken . . . the tables with precious stone inlays were astounding.

Among the paintings that stood out for us were Madonna and Child by F. Lippi, portraits by Botticelli, Madonna Passerti by del Sarto, everything by Raphael and Rubens, and Gentileschi’s Judith and Her Maidservant.

(As a side note, we first saw one of Gentileschi’s paintings at the Met in New York, and then again at the Uffizi — she’s an artist well worth looking up.)

We then went outside for a walk in the Gardens, which turned out to be less interesting than we’d expected. Actually, the works we saw were grotesque (in the negative sense) and really weird. So while we walked a lot, we didn’t really see much of anything.

But here are some pictures to give you a sense of what we saw:

Emerging into the city once again, we went looking for a textile place that I’d found especially recommended. Apparently it was closed, or moved, but they hadn’t updated their website (ARGH!) so we wasted almost an hour on that little project. With that we crossed the Ponte Vecchio, joining 100s of tourists in gawking at jewelry and the like, all over-priced, but much of it lovely. I saw a gorgeous pearl necklace with a silver clasp that was pretty much perfect. J. actually went in and asked the price (lovely man!) . . . and apparently my taste in jewelry is very expensive. (It was $18k. The clasp alone was $1800. Whew.) By this time I’d been on my feet too much, and had eaten nothing after that light breakfast, so we went looking for food.

We had a meal in a place that was pretty much the worst food we’d had in all of Italy. (Not the worst meal ever, but pretty darn close.) It did, however, refuel us enough to get on with the afternoon.

I went home, J. got the car taken care of and then did a little shopping on his own. (Apparently there is a surprise coming for me at some point. Lovely man!) And I . . . had a nap!

From there it was a quiet evening of reading, followed by dinner at Osteria Giovanni again. A lovely way to end our time in Florence.

(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.

(April 12, 2014)

We were up at a good time and able to catch a 9:35 hydrofoil to Naples. A quick taxi to the train station, where we dropped our bags, and then another one to the Archeological Museum.

THIS is where all the good stuff ended up!

Statues and frescoes galore, even mosaics. The wealthy families of Naples looted the area with abandon and its all just sitting here. We spent a good 2+ hours just wandering around, and we were pretty focused. (Oh, and if you’re not prudish, check out the Secret Cabinet.)

Another taxi took us back to the train station where we collected out bags (6 euro/bag, if you care) and caught the high speed train to Firenze. We paid for business class, with silence (no cell phones allowed, at least not to talk on) and it was pretty steep. We could have saved more if we’d bought our tickets in advance, but our schedule has been so loose I couldn’t count on that being an option. (In fact, we did have a firm commitment for an arrival time in Venice so we booked that ticket later. To give you an idea of the savings, 1st class (one way) was 183 eu, but by booking in advance we got a 2-for-1 deal at 92 eu.)

The train ride was nice, and we caught up on reading and a bit of writing. Florence SM is a well laid out station, and we easily found our way to our next lodging: Casa Corsi. This is a lovely jewel of a place set well back (sort of behind another building actually) from a very active street. There is a garden, full kitchen, and good-sized common space. HIGHLY recommended if you’re a typical tourist who’s up and out around 9am and in bed by 9pm. Most rooms share a bathroom, two have their own. (We have one of those.) The bed is comfortable, in the typical twins stuck together, which is saved by then being in a frame so the beds don’t drift apart. Roberta, the owner, met us with cookies and juice and we chatted while checking in. Turns out that this used to be her family’s home and they converted all of the rooms into bedrooms. I can easily see a family growing up here.

The neighborhood is very much a place in transition, but there are tons of local markets and eating places, and you’re literally a 15 minute walk to the Uffizi and environs. Or the Gallerie, or the Pitti (across the river). It’s a SUPER location, and about half the cost of a hotel of the same stars (approx. 60 eu/ night).

We got in a bit late for doing much of anything, so we rested, unpacked, did a bit of laundry and then went out for dinner. Trattoria Osteria Giovanni was our destination, a recommendation from our landlady. (One thing I’ve learned, when a local makes a recommendation, take them up on it.)

This is a popular place — with locals as well as travelers. Lots of languages spoken here, and  the waiters were comfortable with using different words to describe the menu items. This is another restaurant that we feel deserves its reputation for excellence. As we were seated, they brought us Prosecco and small pieces of fried bread. For our starter, we shared the house ravioli — perfect pillows of pasta in a light tomato sauce. My main was braised rabbit in lentils and spinach, J had the steak. They offered biscotti at the end of the meal.

Another lovely walk home and to bed.