After our travels to Lake Como, we had an entire week here in Florence. We enjoyed the leisurely time to get to know our city a bit more. We began to take a peek inside a few of the numerous museums, churches and historical collections that Florence has to offer.
Our flat is nestled conveniently between two beautiful piazzas. One is the piazza of the Church of Santa Croce (Holy Cross), one of Florence’s biggest and oldest churches (begun 1294).
This church was Michelangelo’s home church. He grew up just a few blocks away and attended church here. His remains now rest within the walls of this beautiful church, alongside the remains of Galileo, Dante (a memorial only), Machiavelli and other great Florentines. The shops lining the piazza of Santa Croce were fun to walk through. One jewelry shop sells authentic Roman coins (some dating farther back than 200BC) for extreme amounts of money. It was enjoyable to browse and be reminded of the history of this city and country. Behind the church, but within its boarders, is a leather school where poor people hand-make some of Florence’s greatest leather products (shoes, purses, belts, jewelry and jackets). We walked through the leather school and were impressed with the gorgeous craftsmanship. You can watch them hand-making purses and other items right there. Custom-fit shoes start at 3000-euro (a bit out of our price range)! Inside the church we walked around the perimeter marveling at the artwork and tombs.
Each tomb of the great Florentines was marked with gorgeous hand-carved statues or frescos. Other tombs were roped off as they were marked beneath our feet by carved stone resting places. The stained glass windows and paintings of Jesus were gorgeous as well.
After enjoying the piazza, shops, leather school and now within the church I began to think about how my Grammie would have loved Italy. She loved fashion, jewelry, beauty, food, and in the end she loved Jesus as well. I believe she would have loved the Church of Santa Croce. She passed away much too young at the age of 70, when I was 22. I made an offering and lit a candle for her.
Later in the week we packed a lunch and explored the Boboli Gardens, located behind the Pitti Palace. With Logan, our time to browse museums and art is limited to his attention span, so our joint ticket into the Pitti Palace/Boboli Gardens allowed us a quick tour of the costume gallery before we headed outside to the gardens to let Logan run around.
The Boboli Gardens are vast, and built on a hill overlooking beautiful Florence (it is across the Arno River from the city center).
Studded with statues and fountains, we did our best to explore despite graveled walkways on steep inclines with a stroller. Luckily Logan loves to walk, run, and play on the ground! The empty stroller is much more manageable! We ate lunch on a bench along the perimeter of a pond whose centerpiece is a large statue of Neptune. We had to repeatedly scold Logan on his attempts to squeeze through the metal fencing to get to the pond surrounding the statue. The fish and floating birds were just too tempting for him.
While we’ve had unseasonably pleasant weather in Italy so far, the last few days have warmed up quite a bit and the humidity settled in as well. We set out to find one of three large pools in Florence which are open to the public. We wanted to spend a day cooling off. Without a car we walk everywhere, and none of the pools were very close, but we decided to make the day of it and we headed out on foot. We did call ahead of time, and in broken Italian confirmed (or so we thought) that they were still open for Summer. When we arrived (after a 90 minute walk) the pool gates were closed. Some locals showed up ready to swim at the same time as we did, and they very kindly translated what the sign on the front of the gate said: The pool was closed as of August 26, however, another public pool was open through September, just down the road. For us, this was another 25 minute walk away. Luckily, it took us slightly back the way we came, and in the end the second pool was only a 50 minute walk back to our house. As told, this pool was open! It had a shallow (and VERY cold) children’s pool area, as well as two large and deep pools. It also had a large grassy area to lay out, with benches and sporadic shade. After a short visit to the children’s side, we got out, warmed up our chattering toddler, ate our picnic lunch, and headed to the adult pool. Logan loved jumping off the side and swimming to one of us. His swimming skills kicked right back in and we were very thankful for the lessons he took before we left the US.
Just a block behind our house is the Bargello. The Bargello houses a great collection of sculptures including many works by Michelangelo, as well as Donatello’s David, and the original contest panels for the Baptistery doors (this is the building in front of the Duomo with the famous bronze 3-D doors known as the Gates of Paradise). The creator of the final doors, Ghiberti, won the job after the famous contest event that kicked off the Renaissance. The two panels in the Bargello that we got to see were by Ghiberti and Brunelleschi. While Brunelleschi didn’t win that contest, he later went on to design the incredibly famous dome that caps Florence’s Duomo! At the time, it was the largest church in the world and remains in the top 20. Even today the dome helps to create the majority of the Florentine skyline. The talent and artistic gifts seen throughout this city are indescribable.
Besides all that, we did some of our favorite things as well. We went out to the Ponte Vecchio to catch some live music and a gorgeous sunset.
Logan spent many hours playing in piazzas, at the park, and on the stairs in front of churches.
I enjoyed a couple of afternoons of alone time: one of them I indulged in an enormous gelato in front of the Duomo (dark chocolate, chocolate chip, and coffee), and the next day I relaxed with a mani/pedi. We take turns going out on our own in the afternoons while Logan naps. One of us stays home with him, the other ventures out to explore or relax.
Tonight we welcomed my Swiss sister, Dani, who drove over seven hours to get to us. She will be with us through the weekend, and you can expect a post about our time with her to come!
Arrivederci!
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