My morning started early - today I was headed to see the fish market with Charlotte. We ended up being too early, most of the stalls weren't set up yet! That was okay, though, seeing Venice wake up provided another lens with which to view this gorgeous city.
Is Venice touristy? Yes, a little. Is it crowded? Yes, a lot. Is there still magic to be found in the canals and back alleys? Also yes. Venice captured my heart! But alas, we were off to Florence for our next adventure.
We took the Vaporetto back to the bus and after a comfort stop, we were at Florence's airport on the outskirts of the city. After a quick reminder to keep our wits and bags about us, we arrived in the center of Florence. It was a quick walk to our hotel and then we had time to drop our bags and have some lunch before our walking tour.
Barbie, Andie, Kaysie, Nischi, Aisiri, and Arushi and I popped into Eataly to have a bite. Eataly has several locations all over the world, including Boston and New York. It's part restaurant, part grocery store, and all delicious. The best part of our new hotel was that there was a gelato place across the street! We capped our lunch there, where I tried a Tuscan red wine flavor. It was good!
After a brief rest at the hotel, we joined local guide Alessandro for our walking tour of the city. We saw wine windows, Medici sights, beautiful churches, and of course the Ponte Vecchio. Towards the end of our walk we passed by a wine shop that shipped wine to the United States. Getting wine shipped home to share with my family was one of my goals on this trip. I made a mental note of the name and location so I could return the following afternoon. Our tour concluded with a visit to the Accademia Gallery to see Michelangelo's David.
Seeing David in person was truly awe inspiring. The attention to detail and the carving work are mind blowing. Also housed in the Accademia are Michelangelo's prisoners and a variety of Florentine paintings.
In the relative cool of the evening we set off for our group dinner. This was by far one of my most favorite meals of the entire trip. We started off with a little pasta sampler, a salad, and then moved on to this beautiful piece of Florentine beef. It was indeed served on fire! We rounded that out with potatoes and an entire dessert cart. We also got to pick a traditional digestif to try. I picked grappa, and boy was that an experience!
While some of our group went out to explore Florence at night, I walked back to the hotel with Barbie, Kaysie, and Andie.