Florence

Ahh Florence! I had a very brief visit here 25BC (before children) but it still made it onto my list of top ten favourite cities. We spent 3 days here this time around, and I’m more in love with it than ever before.

Jarrah was rather taken with the Duomo, took a million pics at various times of the day.

Carousel at the Piazza della Repubblica …

… where we had dinner one night and drinks every night.

Still Piazza della Repubblica – yet another filming location from Hannibal 🙂

Ponte Vecchio from a distance and up close.

Visitors to Il Porcellino (Italian for “piglet”) put a coin into the boar’s gaping jaws, with the intent to let it fall through the underlying grating for good luck, and they rub the boar’s snout to ensure a return to Florence, a tradition which keeps the snout in a state of polished sheen while the rest of the boar’s body has patinated to a dull brownish-green. (See pic below).

Florence is so beautiful – every alley and cobble/flagstone street that you walk down, every corner you turn reveals yet another stunning view, another beautiful building, another statue, and it is clean and safe. Love, love, love it. Oh … and the gelato is pretty good too!

Florence by night …

About 10kms outside of Florence is a park with the Colosso dell’ Appennino (the statue below).
It was created by the Flemish sculptor Giambologna (Jean De Boulogne 1529-1608) in 1580. The statue is 14 meters high and is placed to guard the pond in front of it, which is full of giant water lilies.

Despite this being outdoors in a massive park, we (a) had our temperatures taken before we could enter and (b) had to wear our masks for the entire time, even in the 36 degree heat (one of the disadvantages of travelling during the pandemic) 🙂 Not sure if my claustrophobia is getting better or worse.