Friendz in Firenze

Florence (Firenze) is a great town, and we had a great time, spending three nights there. The hostel that we stayed at had a great breakfast and dinner option, which was nice for our budget, but also gathered all the guests out into the common area.

We met 3 guys from northern Virginia, with whom we shared a few bottles of wine. A group of Japanese tourists, who I engaged in awkward conversation in Japanese, a nice photagrapher, Jodi, from LA, and an awesome guy from DC area who's starting up his own film production company.

The first morning we took a guided tour with about 15 other people, and saw a good deal of the lesser known sights of Florence. We also got the best gelato in the city (according to the guide and a Japanese tourist who had tried 20 different places in two days).

After the tour we wandered and found a local Italian place where the menu was handwritten with the day's date written across the top. Fresh, excellent, and filled with locals. We certainly ate our fill of pasta.

The next day was unfortunately fortunate. The last tuesday of September is the day in Florence where they open up all of the museums free to the public. Our hostel keeper told me it was the best way to see Michalangelo's David. Long story short, the David was not on display in the museum where it was, there was some convention going on and it was impossible to get into the section with the David. Our itenerary for museums after the David had us running from one museum to the next finding them closing the doors just as we got there. It was just strokes of bad luck that in the time it took us to get to the museum that closed at 8:30, we would miss the one that closed at 9:00.

We both agree that it's a great city, but we'll have to see it to a fuller extent sometime in the future. We did see a great deal of art, had some great food, and met some great people, so certainly no regrets.

We're ending our day here in Venice now, having taken a brief gondola ride, seen 5 churches and St. Marks square,had all you can eat mussels and pasta, and taken tea at a brilliant little tea shop. Accomdations have been a little more expensive in Venice, but so far we're doing great without breaking the bank.

We've got a week till flying out of Brussels, and while we're still enjoying ourselves, we're a little excited to get home as well.