Running & Reading in Rennes: Florence, Days 2 and 3

Modern version of David outside the
Accademia. Back in antiquity, sculptures
would have been painted this garishly.

NB This was mostly written by Aaron.

The David reproduction
in front of the Palazzo
Vecchio.

Our second day in Florence, we split up for the morning. Lisa and I went to the Galleria dell’Accademia to see Michaelangelo’s David. Because Florence is the city of lines and because we hadn’t thought to book our tickets in advance, we waited nearly two hours to get in. The David itself is an amazing sculpture, but most of the rest of the museum is sort of blah. Because it’s attached to Florence’s fine arts school, it’s largely a teaching museum and there are plenty of interpretative plaques describing restoration techniques on the various paintings and making comparisons between different works. They even had a video playing on the techniques of using gold leaf foil in late medieval painting. Unfortunately, because we were meeting Suzy and Dan for lunch, we couldn’t spend a lot of time there! (Also unfortunately, we couldn’t take pictures inside so you’ll have to do a Google Image search if you want to see a picture of the David. The best we can do is show you a replica of it in the Piazza della Signoria, where it would have originally stood in the Renaissance.)

Suzy and Dan.

We all had lunch at a fantastic sandwich place that Dan’s guidebook recommended then, following that, Dan and Lisa made the climb to the top of the cathedral dome while Suzy and I stayed below, she because she’s six months pregnant and me because I didn’t think I could handle the height! So we got coffee and chatted while we waited for them. You can see all the pictures from the climb at the bottom of this entry. It's pretty impressive!

Perseus in the Piazza. (We're providing
you with pictures of things not forbidden).

Following that, we went back to Dan and Suzy’s hotel and played a very fun strategy game, “Settlers of Catan,” and had dinner at a pretty good place right across the street from the hotel – their ribollita soup was amazing. In fact, we liked it so much that Lisa and I went back the next night for more!

Dan and Suzy left the next day to return home to the States and Lisa and I explored Florence on our own. Unfortunately, I had been nursing a cold most of the trip and that, combined with all the traveling, caused me to crash that afternoon. But before that point, we had fun. We started at the Bargello Museum, my favorite museum in Florence. It’s mostly Renaissance sculpture, including Donatello’s early fourteenth century David, the first free-standing bronze nude made since ancient Roman times. (Again, no pictures were allowed.)

Part of the Fiorita festival.

Other part of Fiorita festival.

After that, we walked to the main city square in front of the city hall for the Fiorita festival, which we had seen was going to happen that morning. It’s held every year on May 23^rd to honor Girolamo Savonarola, a fifteenth-century Florentine monk who stood up to the ruling Medici family, got the people of Florence to kick them out, advocated that the Florentines give up their wealth and luxurious lifestyle during his two years of power in the city, then was burned at the stake (on May 23^rd) as a heretic when the Medicis and the Pope teamed up to eliminate him. The festival was pretty cool. We missed the beginning when they laid flowers on the plaque in the square marking the spot where he was burned, but we heard the mayor’s speech and saw a fairly large group of men and women in Renaissance dress. From there, we followed their procession to the Ponte Vecchio over the Arno River where the women threw baskets of rose petals into the river, just as Savonarola’s ashes were thrown in in 1498. It was pretty cool to see.

Courtyard of Palazzo Vecchio.

That afternoon, we quickly wandered through the courtyard of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence’s city hall for the last 800 years, which is full of old frescoes. After that, we went to the Uffizi, home of Florence’s fantastic collection of Renaissance painting, most done by Florentines. We booked ahead for this one, so we didn’t’ have to wait in line. I love the Botticelli collection, including The Birth of Venus and Primavera, but overall, it was hard for me to concentrate and absorb it all because I wasn’t feeling so hot. (Again, no pictures are allowed, so we can’t show you any!) After the museum, we went to Santa Maria Novella, a former monastery church with some nice early Renaissance frescoes in some of the chapels. (Once again, pictures were verboten!) We didn’t stay long before heading back to the hotel so I could nap.

Ribolita soup at dinner.

After dinner that night, and the night before, too, for that matter, we enjoyed some of Florence’s nighttime street life. There always seem to be a lot of people walking around at night and musicians, many of them good, all over the place. Strolling around Florence in the evening was a great way to end our time in the city because it reinforced how much we enjoy Italy.