Florence

We arrived in Florence around 8 that night and headed out to the the Duomo, which was of course amazing even at night. I was very excited to see it.

The colored marble made it look almost unreal, like a very large dollhouse.

We got some pastries, but unfortunately they were nowhere near as good as the napolitanas of Spain. We decided to stick to gelato while in Italy.

We walked over the the old bridge and saw the view of the river.

Here we are by the Duomo during the day.

The baptistery doors, which I was excited to see because I had of course studied them in Art History class.

Here's Megan in one of the piazzas that we visited.

Here I am in that same piazza in front of the church.

In that same piazza we also met this man Sam:

Sam tried to sell our father a leather coat. He took us to his family's leather factory and had him try on some pretty sweet ones, but in the end dad decided that he didn't really need a $400 jacket. Sam did have excellent style though.

Here we have some typical European PDA, I guess it's not just a Spanish thing. I got this picture while we were chilling in front of the Pitti Palace.

Here is the baptistery again. We spent quite a bit of time just hanging out enjoying the sights and the weather.

My best attempt at capturing the whole Duomo. Kind of a failure still.

On Easter we woke up early so that we could see the procession that ended in front of the Duomo. We got there at like 8:30 but things didn't get rolling until around 10:30. But it was well worth the wait. A bunch of people in awesome costumes marched in and lined up.



Then they brought in this sweet wooden float type thing pulled by oxen, which the proceeded to attach fireworks to.

A woman gave a bunch of people in the crowd flowers. Here are Megan and I sporting ours.

Then all of a sudden this dove shot from inside the church and lit the firecrackers on the float, which led to a crazy amount of very loud fireworks. It reminded me slightly of las fallas, but not quite as epic.



It shot out lots of colored smoke too.


My dad found the fireworks a little too loud and still complains about a slight loss of hearing in one of his ears.

So insane. We were slightly concerned that we would be hit by the fireworks because they were right in front of us, but luckily we made it.



This old man was hanging around with the fire fighters and kept smoking his cigar. We really liked him.

After the fabulous firework display we went to the Bobili gardens behind the Palazio Pitti. They were really beautiful and the weather was lovely.

There was a lovely view of Tuscony from the top of the gardens.

Megan and I got matchingish knot rings at an art market, which we were very excited about, especially me because mine is similar to another knot ring I have from a market in London.

My dad was a huge fan of the tree arches and wants us to set some up in our backyard. We're working on it.


A view of the bridges in Florence when we were walking back from unsuccessfuly trying to see some Masaccio frescos in a church. Turned out you had to have a reservation.

While in Florence we also saw Michelangelo's David and Donatellos' David in addition to the Uffizi museum, which has lots of Botticcellis and some Da Vincis. It was a lovely trip, but on Sunday evening we headed back to Rome and then from there we flew to Madrid.

Megan and I made our way from our hotel in Madrid back to Alcala for one last visit to pick up my luggage I had stored at my host family's house. I finally took a picture with them, so if you were wondering what they looked like, here are Ana and Paco:

From Madrid we flew to London and then to Washington DC where we passed customs and returned to our home in Virginia. And that concludes my European adventures for now.

Roma

On Monday Megan and I flew into Rome and met up with our father. We took the train to our hotel and dropped off our stuff and then went out to dinner. Immediately after that we were off to the Trevi Fountain to throw our coins in.

Here we are mid-toss:

We were all pretty excited to be in Italy.

After the fountain we were of to the Pantheon, more because the world's best gelato shop is located nearby it than for historical reasons.

Here we are at Della Palma gelato shop. On that cone is chocolate coconut, chocolate fondente, and chocolate pistacio. Delicious. We went there every day we were in Rome.

Then we were off for a quick peek at the colosseum, which was quite epic.

The next day we were off to the Palatine hill and Roman Forum. Epic (basically the only word to describe all of Rome).

Megan found a friend.

An awesome view from the hill:


In the Roman Forum:


After the Forum we grabbed paninis and then went to the Colosseum, which was of course even more awesome than it appeared in Mary-Kate and Ashley's "When in Rome." Surprising, I know.


In following along with the plot of WHen in Rome, we of course went to the Spanish Steps, and paused midway up commenting on how odd it was that we were in Rome, on Spanish steps.

In the Piazza Navona:

On Wednesday we went to the Vatican, and I was pleasantly surprised to find the Laocoon sculpture there, which I had studied in my Art History.

Also, Raphael's School of Athens was there, which I had also studied and even written a few papers on.

The Sistine Chapel was of course outsanding, but you are not allowed to take pictures of it. But I was nonetheless thrilled to finally see it.

Here we are in front of St. Peter's just after the Pope was out.

The line to go inside St. Peters was super long so we made our way back to the Pantheon so that we could see the inside. It really is lit only by the hole in the ceiling. Cool.


We of course made a quick stop at Della Palma for some gelato before going back to St. Peters, where we saw Michelangelo's Pieta, which is one of the most outstanding sculptures I have ever seen.


We climbed to the top of the dome, which I was obviously excited about. It had an amazing view.



Then we sat our front of the basilica so that my father could rest his feet after the climb up to the dome.

For some reason Megan and I were intent on taking a picture of just our eyes. We finally succeeded.

Thursday was probably my favorite day of the whole trip. We took the metro to a bus station and then a bus to Tivoli, where we saw Villa d' Este, which was an old Cardinal's house with amazing gardens. More importantly though, it is also the place where Lizzie and Paolo go on their little romantic evening in The Lizzie Mcguire Movie.


It had lots of amazing fountains, which were beyond beautiful. (You may recognize this one from the movie, the run behind it)

There was this fantastic line of fountains with funny faces shooting the water out their mouths. Awesome.

This fountain was interesting. I'm thinking of installing one just like it in my yard.



That afternoon we took the bus back to Rome and got some gelato before catching a train to Florence.