The Good Ol' Boot

Six Euro never tasted so good.

We arrived in Florence after traveling all night and most of the morning. Despite sleeping on a steel floor the night before we were excited to see the city. We started to walk around the city and almost immediately ran into a parade. We have no idea what the parade was for, but someone told us something about how everyone in it is unemployed. I don't know if this was Florence's way to give them something to do or perhaps shame them into jobs, but I know if I had to wear those tights I would be looking for employment real fast.

Don't quit your day job... Wait

Once the parade finished we continued to walk around and take the city in. Florence is a city that has chosen to stay in the 15th century. That isn't to say that it doesn't have all the modern amenities, but as you walk around you can see how the city appears now just as it would in the renaissance.

Happy times

I loved being able to turn the corner and see or go into the very places that I have read about for years. It really is no wonder that so many of the worlds great artists have came from the unique city. The Duomo seems to be a painting just by itself.

The front of Duomo

In summary the city is pretty awesome. We even found the "hidden bakery" in the city which surprisingly enough is just a bakery. Turns out that if you want to get a slice of pizza really late at night it is the only place open. We had our pizza and made it back right as the hostel was locking up for the night/morning. Having discovered the small and very local bakery we decided that we have conquered this place and it is time to move to Rome. So one short train ride later and we were there.

Rome, home to the Colosseum, the Pantheon, Vatican city, and a really crappy metro. We were forced to walk almost everywhere do to the metro closing or just not working that day for no real reason. Not that walking through a city this gorgeous is bad, but after roaming the city for 7 hours each day you just want a freaking metro train. First up was the Colosseum and the Pantheon.

THERE'S A TIGER IN THERE!

Unfortunately, Dave started to feel ill during the day we had to walk across town because the metro decided that it didn't need to open up till the evening.

Notice the people in the righthand corner.  This place is huge.

God's flashlight

Even worse, this is the day we decided to go to the Vatican. I am sure seeing me grinning the whole time didn't help him either.

Yellow fever.

 

I was running around like a kid in a candy store taking pictures. We got to the Sistine chapel where you aren't supposed to take pictures, but I wasn't about to let some "rule" stop me. Using Dave as a shield I snapped a bunch of pictures.

Ninja skills

For the sake of not making this post any longer than it already is I will wrap it up by saying that we enjoyed seeing all the sights, but the masses of other tourists kinda wore us out, it wasn't even the high season either. After Rome we jumped on a boat to Croatia. Thats another post though. Be sure to check out my great lesson on the history of the Colosseum in the video. Real educational.