So I suppose I should begin by rehashing the last night in Venice.. let's see: Italian kareoke bar and 2 euro drinks.. I guess a good recap would be to say that my 50+ year old male married professor sang "My Girl" to some students and there was a video of people getting down to the YMCA on tables.. There were basically only seven English songs on the kareoke machine.. one of which was T.A.T.U. "All the Things She Said" - download it if you don't remember. That's a good enough summary of the first hour..
Anyways, the Guggenheim was awesome. Definitely tied for my favorite museum thus far (with the Musee D'Orsay). I guess I really like Futurism and more modern art. Alter pieces get unbelievably dull after a while.
After a few hour bus ride in the afternoon, we got to Firenze. Florence is perfect. I absolutely could have studied here for the summer/a semester instead of traveling, but I wouldn't change my experience for the world. I just love it. It's the perfect size city. The hotel has bikes that you can borrow for free, and today I rode only about half an hour outside the main city into the suburbs along the river and it was the most beautiful and relaxing thing I've done all trip. It truly epitomized my vision of the Tuscan countryside. I wish I could describe the area/scenery better.. I can't even come up with words that would do it justice.
The food here is to die for. Maybe we've just been really lucky with finding really good, cheap places, but I've dined like a queen over the last few days and my wallet doesn't ache - for once.
Yesterday we had a free day and in the afternoon we had an option to pay a bit and take a bus to Pisa for an hour and then onto a vineyard for wine tasting/dinner in Tuscany. Obviously, I could never resist such an offer. Pisa was cool, we got our pictures with the leaning tower and walked around town a bit. Not nearly as dirty of a city as I've been told it was (maybe I was expecting the worst) but I thought it was actually quite quaint and clean.. just REAL touristy. After Pisa we went to a vineyard in Monte Carlo (about a 45 minute drive) and saw the grape vines and olive trees. We saw how they made olive oil and then they got us drunk. I was expecting a true wine tasting.. where you sip and spit... oh no. They sat us at long tables, divided us up by 6 and put 8 bottles of wine in front of each group. They told us the order in which to drink the wines and brought us plates of homemade flat "macaroni" pasta, unbelievable sundried tomatoes, olive oil and the best balsamic vinegar I've ever had (aged five years!), and other such foods. We finished with a sweet dessert wine - "holy wine" they called it.. but it wasn't sherry. It actually tasted more like apple brandy and some biscotti to dip into it. Personally I didn't think the wine was that special. The food, on the other hand, was to die for. (And yes, although not required or even recommended, my table actually did a real wine tasting with all 5 kinds before we actually drank them so people knew what they liked if they were going to buy. - I try to maintain class where possible. ;-).. )
Today we went to Accademia and saw Michelangelo's David. I never really though much of going to see a statue until I got inside. This thing is indescribable. I seriously stared at it for like 20 minutes.. and could have for much longer. Really neat. We also went to the Uffizi gallery.. but it pretty much sucked besides the Botticelli's and the views of the city. We also spent a little bit of time touring the leather markets, and I am incredibly proud of myself. While about half the group spent 200+ euro (so like $350) on real soft leather bags with their initials embossed on them, etc. (and they were all gorgeous, mind you).. I didn't partake in the expensive excursion and instead bought real leather bracelets for cheap. I love all the markets here though.. it makes the town seem so lively and cultured. I wish there were markets everywhere at home.
I'm pretty sure I missed a few stories, but I think I've hit the main points of Florence. Basically, my life would be complete if I could own a vacation home half an hour bike ride outside the city.
Tomorrow we're headed off to Rome. Our final destination. :(. Four weeks has gone by so fast! Hopefully I'll be able to find internet and write once in Rome before flying to Barcelona on Sunday for the cruise. This sounds crazy, but I haven't seen a single gypsy yet and am kind of excited to see what all the fuss is about in the next few days. Haha.
xoxoxoxoxo
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