Day 31, Tuesday May 29, 2012

Kind of a weird day today. We left San Gimingnano and headed out to Il Paluffo, our next country house. The place was only about half an hour away, so we got there at noon, but no one was around. We drove to a nearby town and picked up a few things for dinner.

Eventually, we wound up back at Il Paluffo and just sat outside reading for a few hours. Happily, the house cat came by for a visit.

Eventually we got checked in. Like every other place in Italy...tough to get to, and then absolutely lovely once you get settled in. We spent the afternoon by the green pool (a biologically cleaned swimming pool) admiring the fantastic scenery.

In the evening we pulled out the dinner stuff we'd bought earlier and ate and drank next to the pool.

It is very quiet here.

Had a great sleep.

Day 30, Monday May 28, 2012

Had a long bath on the porch this morning...the day started out misty and drizzly.

Fortunately, the weather cleared over the course of the day, and we were on the road again...this time to San Gimingnano. This picture of Kimberley was taken in the hills between Cecina and Volterra.

Everywhere we drove, especially in Spain and Italy, we passed cyclists. This is a big sport in Europe.

San Gimingnano is another traffic restricted medieval town. After going through the rigmarole of parking and getting to Hotel L'Antico Pozzo, we discovered a really cool town.

Though touristy like so many other places we'd been (Carcassonne, Avignon, etc.) we liked this place more.

There we lots of charming streets, courtyards and ruins.

And artists. Kimberley bought a CD from this guy, and I got a little watercolour from a painter just to the left of this scene.

The view was spectacular.

 I visited the famed torture museum (sweet Jesus).

And then we went to San Gimingnano 1300, which presents the history of the city and a very cool 1/100 scale model of the town as it existed in 1300 AD.

The city thrived on the saffron trade. But it was whacked by plague in 1348. The town was then de-populated for 300 years.

The detail in the model was fantastic.

 There was a larger model of a street scene.

We had dinner in a local restaurant and then we went back to the hotel for the night.

Day 29, Sunday May 27, 2012

A lazy morning to start off a lazy day. Swimming, bath, sunshine...not much else to say about today.

Kimberley's iPhone is keeping track of how many pictures she's been taking. Today she passed 1500.

Kimberley wanted to eat at the hotel again tonight...so that's what we did. The food was OK.

Day 28, Saturday May 26, 2012

Left Firenze this morning. Weird route out of the city...took forever on some very sketchy roads. But really liked this city, and we stayed in such a nice hotel.

So, we were really happy with Italy so far, but we were not prepared for how nice Poggio ai Santi, near San Vincenzo, was going to be. Here's the view from our veranda with the Med and Elba island on the horizon.

In the Tuscan countryside overlooking the sea, we had a great room...

...with a great view...

...with a tub on the veranda!

On the way to the hotel, we stopped at San Vincenzo and took a walk on the beach. And once we got to the country house, we had a chilly swim in the pool there.

Nice flowers everywhere.

We went to the restaurant at the hotel, and it was tasty, but I'm really enjoying the smaller town restaurants more so far.

Too bad we were only staying two nights at this place...love it.

Day 27, Friday May 25, 2012

We started off the day a little easier that the previous few. We were pretty much museum-ed out, so in the morning we walked up to the central market. The was the nicest market we'd seen on the entire trip. Lots of stuff, clean and an interesting assortment of vendors.

We then hit some open-air vendors and other stores. Finally, we just walked the streets and took in more of the Firenze atmosphere.

 We grabbed a quick lunch back at Gusto Leo and I had some Tuscan bean soup with bread. I was really liking the simple Tuscan recipes I'd been tasting at the restaurants here.

Mmmm, more Italian wine.

In the afternoon, we walked around the Arno river again, and we got some very creamy ice cream.

In the evening I went out for a haircut. Language barrier fail. Kimberley and I were trying to describe how much hair I wanted taken off (showing a small space between index finger and thumb). The woman took this as the final length of the cut. Hair carnage ensued.

End result was in evidence at dinner.

Day 26, Thursday May 24, 2012

Our hotel has perfect staff. We had a quick breakfast and then left for the Accademia gallery. You didn't have to get to far into this place to see the most impressive statue every created, Michelangelo's David.

This work of art lives up to the hype. Incredible.

Later, we took a walk through the Baboli gardens. At 20 Euros, the place is not worth it...though it's pleasant enough.

Noce grounds.

And a good view of the Duomo.

Afterwards, I grabbed a beer and panini, while Kimberley had some lemon sorbet. She then picked up a pair of shoes she had hunted down, and I got a small plaster statue I want to turn into a hobby project.

At dinner, I have some Tuscan bread soup, and it is delicious. We watched The Hulk before going to bed. Not very good...but at least we've now seen all the Avenger origin movies.

Day 25, Wed May 23, 2012

We bought tickets to the Uffizi last night, so after a quick breakfast we got into this fantastic museum/gallery at 9:00 AM.

The material was better, and more wonderfully presented, than at the Louvre.

Lots of Roman sculpture (most of which were copies of Greek pieces...but what the heck).

The place was enormous.

My favourite part of the gallery was the room filled with Botticelli pieces.

Incredible work.

And so much of it.

We liked the few Rembrandt paintings they had as well.

We went to a restaurant for lunch for a change and had some great salads. I also had a vegetable soup with rice, which was really good. Late in the afternoon we were at the Basilica Di San Lorenzo for more renaissance goodness.

In the evening after dinner, we took a walk down to the Ponte Vecchio.

It was very pretty.