We also stumbled upon a little shop that has become one of our favourite lunch destinations - Marione'.
Wednesday was a great day as I got my results from my final CA exam and passed, such a relief! We decided it was only fair that we go back shopping and actually buy something this time.
 |
| Anna can keep making us walk past T&Co all she wants, but we're only looking! |
Thursday I was back in the gym while Anna was honing her Italian (which is getting better and better each week), before we had lunch at Pino's. Pino is a great man and has a little shop near our apartment; we go there all the time for toasted panini's. My usual is either roast pork or roast beef with pecorino cheese, roast potatoes, lettuce and pesto sauce, OMG amazing and only 3.50 euro! Anna's palate is a little bit more expansive than mine and so her lunch changes each time we go in. I am hoping that by the end of our stay in Firenze, Pino will have added my panino to his list and call it something like the Aussie Panino or even the Lachie panino haha.
That afternoon we again went shopping without actually buying anything, spending most of our time in the Salvatore Ferragamo shop and the shoe museum underneath it that included shoes worn by stars such as Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe - more exciting for Anna.....
That night after a home cooked meal of take-away souvlaki's, we went to Pallazzo Strozzi (Thursday nights are free!) with a couple of Anna's friends from her school. One exhibition was a huge art display called 'Americani a Firenze' which was dedicated to the work of American painters who spent time in Italy, focusing in particular on their relationship with Florence in the decades spanning the close of the 19th and dawn of the 20th centuries. We then went to the 'American Dreamers' exhibit which comprised work of artists who used fantasy, imagination and dreams to create what the called contemporary art; it was plain weird.
Friday was a bit of a nothing day as we scoured the city looking for easter eggs in readiness for Sunday. We ended up finding some, but were not impressed with the lack chocolate eggs on offer. We were however suitably impressed with the imagination of some. I wish we had bought them.......
As we had decided not to go away this weekend, Saturday was the perfect day to go to the Uffizi Gallery, especially as the weather continued its trend of raining all day! The night before Anna had told me that one of the reasons she loved me was my ability to push in front of queue's and today it was utilised with magnificent results. We were able to skip a 2-3hr long line (at least 300-400 people) and were in the gallery in less than 10 minutes, Bruce Mcavaney would have called it a very special effort.
Even with my lack of excitement for art, the Uffizi was a pretty impressive place and even housed pieces of art that I recognised such as Botticelli's 'Birth of Venus'.
That night we had a quiet night as we were up early to get a good position for Florence's Easter Sunday celebrations, the 'Scoppio del Carro' (explosion of the cart) - A 30ft tall antique cart is hauled in by a team of huge white oxen, escorted by 150 soldiers, musicians and people in 15th century dress.
A mechanical dove is fitted to a wire stretching from the top of the cart, to the altar inside the cathedral. The cardinal of Florence lights a fuse which sends the dove flying out of the church, igniting the cart outside. A 20 minute display of fireworks follows, which was so amazing, it was that loud it sounded like a war was going on!
A successful display from the explosion of the cart is supposed to guarantee a good harvest, stable civic life and good business. Funnily enough, the last time the explosion of the cart was not carried out successfully, it was 1966 when later in the year Florence was ravaged by horrible floods!
Monday and Tuesday were public holidays and there was not much to do as everything was closed. We spent the days walking around town, continuing our scrabble battle, reading our books and had home cooked meals with Gossip Girl on the laptop! This was helped by the fact that it was still raining, it has been such a bad few weeks of weather, it better get better soon!
Wednesday, was again shitty weather, so I slept in and then read all about how badly the Dees had been going. Anna and I went to the market for lunch, mucked around for the arvo, went to the gym and then for the second time, went to Pin Gusto for dinner where you pay 20 euro each for all you can eat Japanese, which again saw us walking out a few kg's heavier!
Surprise surprise, thursday was another shitty day. I decided to visit Palazzo Davanzati in the morning. It was built in the 1400's and home to the wealthy Davanzati family from 1578. It was a really interesting building and gave you a real insight into how the rich people lived back in the really old days. The original owners faces are carved on the pillars in the courtyard (quite a nice touch, I think I'll have that done in my house) and the bedrooms on the first and second floors were fascinating.
Afterwards I met Anna and her school friends at the market for lunch, which was a delicious pasta ragout and a roast pork roll. Anna then introduced me to her favourite fruit lady, who was much friendlier than my favourite fruit man. She even gave me a free mandarine so I bought a bottle of limoncello off her, which I am now drinking before dinner reach night!
That night we went out for aperitivo which we go to roughly once a week. You go to one of many bars around town and buy a cocktail for around 6-8 euro and then you have all you can eat dinner for the night which varies depending on what bar you are at, but usually consists of different pasta's, rice dishes, salad's etc. pretty good value!
Friday morning I went to the gym, then we packed our bags and headed for Milan!
No comments:
Post a Comment