When in Florence...

(I don't know why this is high-lighted. Sorry). That's right folks, I spent the weekend in Florence! I went with 10 other people, while about 20 people from the Centro were going to Venice at the same time. So the Centro was near empty. And Florence was amazing! We took a 3 hour train ride there, which made us very nervous for the weekend, because this was the view outside our window for the entire trip:

Guys... did we accidentally board a train to Moscow?

Through some miracle, when we reached Florence there was not a speck of snow to be seen. I still don't know how this is possible, but since I did not bring snow shoes, I won't complain! Once we got in we walked to our hostel, which was not as sketchy as I feared (we did realize too late that our room had no doorknob, but it worked out!), and then headed out in search of dinner. One of the first things I noticed about Florence- It is SO clean! After three weeks in Rome I've gotten used to looking at my feet while walking in fear of stepping in dog crap, and seeing papers and wrappers everywhere. Florence, compared to that, is spotless. However, it is also basically made of tourists and American study-abroad students, so I'll take Rome. 

We ended up having dinner at a small Italian (shocker) restaurant with OK food for Italy (which is really really good). After dinner we wandered around for a while, found nothing but cold and returned to the hostel for sleep. 

The next morning we headed out at 9, got a quick breakfast and headed off to Uffizi! Another thing about Florence- it's tiny (or at least the part we were in). What I thought, judging by the map, would be at least a 20 minute walk ended up taking 5 minutes. And almost anywhere we went, this was looking down on us. 

Not a bad view, huh....

At the Uffizi I was overwhelmed by all of the beautiful things including Boticelli's 'Birth of Venus' and 'Primavera'. Seeing all of these incredible works of art which I've heard about and learned about so often was like a dream. When I reached the room holding these two famous works, I just stood in front of each in awe for a few minutes, not believing that I was actually looking at the real thing. After this awe-inspiring beautiful thing, we split up and headed over to the next awe-inspiring beautiful thing on our list, Duomo (seen above). We spent some time inside, though it cost money to see the actual interesting things, and then, after lunch, headed over to the Archeology Museum, which was closed. So the Academia came next! Once again, full of overwhelmingly beautiful things including David! I might have taken an illegal photograph of David... But now I am one of few people who has pictures of all 3 Davids in Florence:

                         Replica outside Uffizi and Bronze overlooking the city.                                            

Erm. This is illegal.

After breaking the law and such, we walked around Florence for a bit, where my soul died every time I looked at a relatively cheap pair of leather boots I could not afford (I keep reminding myself I will be here with my parents who love me and buy me shoes). We got some gelato, which may have been the worst decision of my life since it was below freezing weather outside, and then happened upon a chocolate festival! If you know me, you know that there is nothing better I could possibly come upon, ever. I got some spiced wine (Ancient Greek/Game of Thrones reference? Eh?) and, of course, chocolate. Which was amazing. After some more wandering we crossed the river on the Ponte Vecchio and found an amazing restaurant for dinner. I had gnocchi with tripe, which I discovered was stomach half way through the meal. Which is fine, because it was amazing! Another new food-xperience! We then climbed a giant hill to see the 3rd David and get an amazing view of the entire city and all of it's bridges, got some drinks and went to bed. 

This morning a few of us got up early to go to try the Archeological Museum again. It was open, and once again, we saw amazing things, like this Etruscan chimaera bronze that we read about for class just a few weeks ago!

This is NOT an illegal picture! Hurray!

After this it was off to the train and back to Rome! It was a nice feeling getting back to Rome and realizing I felt like I was back home, even after only 3 weeks. Now that I'm home, I need to tackle the homework I put off all weekend! Ciao!