We arrived in Pisa airport about midnight and waited around for a taxi for a good 20 minutes. What kind of city doesn't have cars queuing at the airport taxi stand? The cushy taxi took us to our nice hotel where Emmet and I crashed in the king sized bed and Silas and Orrin were asleep in a matter of seconds after jammies and diaper were on in their side by side twins.
In the morning we stuffed ourselves with croissants, yogurt, granola, ham, salami, cheese, fruit, eggs, bacon, toast, milk and coffee.
We discovered that the front tire on the stroller had a thorn in it and was flat so Orrin and Silas went to talk to the hotel manager, an avid biker, about where to get it repaired. We found out that Friday was Liberation Day so every bike shop, gas station, etc was closed. I think this made for an extra crowded weekend in both Pisa and Florence as well. We headed out to the leaning tower to get our required pictures, run around in the sun, and roll in the grass. It was a gorgeous day and the tower and palace were quite pretty. We didn't climb the tower because we had the two boys and our three bags and stroller. Orrin kept commenting how he felt so self sufficient and savvy that here we were with two kids on a four day holiday and we could carry all our luggage with us easily.
We headed to the train station with plenty of time before our train, or so I thought- seems I had forgotten to change times on my watch. So we just missed the 12:30 train and had to wait for the 1:30. No big deal, Silas was snoozing in the stroller, the sun was shining, there was a nice grassy area with a fountain. We relaxed in the shade and took pictures of Emmet. Silas woke up just before we had to board the train so his usual wake up crankiness was diverted by train excitement. He loved the train and spent the hour long trip to Florence munching an apple, pointing out tracks and trains out the window, and marveling that there was a potty on the train.
Once in Florence we hit a gelateria on the way to the apartment. Silas had mint chip, Orrin went for raspberry, I had tiramisu. The apartment was just a block from the Duomo and had a view from the bedroom window. The kitchen was tiny, and the whole place was cluttered with knick knacks but there was plenty of room to play, and spread out. It felt quite homey.
We spent the rest of the day just wondering around getting the lay of the city, admiring the piazzas, the statues in teh cortyard of the Uffizi, complaining about the crowds on PonteVecchio, eating pizza in front of the Pitti Palace. Even Emmet couldn't resist the pizza. (It's better in Rome though.)
Even though we had an apartment I didn't want to cook dinner, but rather enjoy the yummy pasta and meat dishes at the restaurants. This made it one of our more expensive trips, but the food was too good to be making grilled cheese in the apartment. Although the Central Market we found on the last day did have some gorgeous meat, cheese, and bread stands, the grilled cheese probably would have been excellent too.
The first night we had a cheese platter and mixed crostini. The cheese was served with honey and was excellent. The crostini were disappointing- barely ripe tomatoes, one was just a piece of toast with olive oil. But then I had a lovely shrimp and tomato with fresh pasta dish and Orrin had an amazing potato ravioli with roasted wild boar in a wine sauce. Yum! Gelato cone number two for dessert. Chocolate hazelnut and pear for me, strawberry and chocolate for Silas, and raspberry and dark chocolate for Orrin.
The next morning we had breakfast and headed out early to the Academia. I had stupidly not reserved tickets to either major gallery before the trip. But we arrived as soon as it opened and were in to see Michaelangelo's David in 15 minutes. Holy crap! I didn't realize it was so big! It's massive. There were also some unfinished sculptures, called the Prisoners. You got the feeling that the human forms were imprisoned in the stone and Michaelangelo was just helping them to escape. It was actually more amazing and interesting and beautiful to me to see the chisel marks and the sculpture taking shape than to look at the David masterpiece. There was also a very interesting exhibit of musical instruments from the Medici collection. A trumpet guitar and a piano guitar...very unique.
Next we searched out a bike shop to repair the wheel on the stroller. The front tire seemed to be holding air so we just filled it and bought a patch kit in case it deflated later. It ended up only able to hold air for about 36 hours, and by that time we decided we were headed home anyway and we'd just fix it there.
We grabbed some pasta salads at a deli and waited in the queue for the Pitti Palace and Boboli Gardens. We rambled along in the gardens, relaxed in the grass, admired the fountains, ate our lunch in a tunnel of trees. Silas posed with some lion sculptures, pointed out the orange and lemon trees, and ran around a lot. The interior of the palace was ok. Somehow we had bought a ticket that didn't let us in to every area. I think toting two kids and looking bedraggled got us in to see the royal apartments, even though we weren't supposed to. Because you're not allowed to take pictures in most of the galleries we visited, I have to admit they all sort of blended together. Orrin decided on a "cheap but excellent pizza" place for dinner but it didn't open until 7:00, so we grabbed another gelato, peanut butter, strawberry, and chocolate. And headed up the hills on the south side of the city to the Piazza Michaelangelo. Pushing the stroller and carrying Emmet up that hill definitely earned us our ice cream! But the view was amazing.
We stopped at a grocery store adn bought some breakfast items- milk, yogurt, salami, cheese. Then had some great pizza, eggplant and artichoke for me, and spicy sausage for Orrin with a crispy thin crust adn sweet saucy tomato and just a it of super flavorful cheese. And a wonderful bottle of chianti. Note to self: Orrin does not drink half the bottle and you will end up drinking more than you meant to.
On the walk home we stumbled upon a cool little market. I cursed myself for buying cheese and salami at a grocery store, but we did buy some great dried fruit; kiwi, strawberries, pears, melon, figs, dates. And some yummy cannoli, and pistachio/marzipan cookies that I loved but Silas and Orrin didn't.
Sunday we thought we'd try the same trick of getting out early and go to the Uffizi without reservation. Even 15 minutes before it opened the line was huge so we decided to skip it. Instead we went to the Bargello sculpture museum, which has Donatello's bronze David sculpture- being restored....Oh well. It was actually quite fun going to museums with Silas and getting him to describe what he sees, or look for babies in sculptures, or musical instruments, or whatever. There wasn't lots of uninterrupted time for reading in depth descriptions and histories, but that's ok. The building itself of this museum was a former prison and quite interesting on it's own.
We strolled through the street market, I was tempted by gorgeous shoes but restrained by enormous feet. Instead I bought some ceramic and wood salad servers, and a handbag for a friend who had asked me to bring her one. We stopped to buy bread for Monday's breakfast, sandwiches for lunch, sat and had coffee. Silas fell asleep before our lunch and slept through Santa Maria Novella Church, and the subsequent ice cream stop. So we stopped again for chips/french fries/papas frit and milk for him.
Our tickets to the Pitti Palace were also good for another garden, so we tried going there, but it was only for one day so they wouldn't let us in. Instead we headed up to Fort Belvedere for another view of Florence, and a small art exhibit. There was another entrance to the gardens, and Orrin was able to sneak us in there where they don't look at your tickets as carefully. This garden was really lovely- shadier with more flowers than Boboli. We didn't have a lot of time there, but it was really nice. Especially the dragon canal and the tunnel of wisteria.
We were a bit un-adventerous and went to the same restaurant for dinner that night. Hey- we were able to eat outside, it was delicious, family friendly, cheap...don't mess with success. We didn't order the same thing at least. We had zucchini risotto with a smoked cheese that made it taste like the zucchini had been grilled, and a lovely pear stuffed ravioli with cheese sauce, Orrin had to have a pizza- artichoke, mushroom, olive, and ham. Silas colored and ate next to nothing. So we ordered a bread, cheese and fruit plate in the end so he'd have a little something in his tummy. Turned out he was just really tired and fell asleep on the walk home.
Our last morning was Monday. We finished up all our breakfast food blueberries, yogurt, hard boiled egg, bread, cheese, jam, salami. Then packed up all our bags. Because it was still early we left the bags there and headed to the Duomo museum nearby. This was my favorite museum we visited. It seemed to have the best variety of works and detailed and interesting descriptions. Donatello's bronze of Mary Magdalane was very strange- Silas immediately called it scary and said that she was a witch. But they also had a really joyful choir box carved in marble of children playing instruments, stone reliefs that were never used on the outside of the Duomo depicting the 30 occupations that are mentioned in the Bible, information about how Brunelleschi built the dome and tools and ideas he essentially had to re-invent from Roman times. There was a version of a Pieta by Michelangelo- one he intended for his own tomb, but a flaw in the marble broke Jesus's arm so he abandoned it.
We decided not to go up into the dome since we'd be lugging two heavy children up 300 some stairs. It would have been interesting to see the architecture up close, but maybe some other time... From the bottom it was beautiful enough, the dome and the paintings make it seem lighter than air.
It struck me as really interesting how there are many things in Florence still unfinished, the facade of San Lorenzo for example, because patrons died, artists were pulled away on other projects, changing fashions, etc. It seems like it must have been so expensive and so much wok and so beautiful, and yet like today when things are seen as old or unfashionable they are torn away and changed.
In the Medici chapel- also half covered in scaffolding thanks to a block of marble that fell off the ceiling last year- there are still empty naves for sculptures that were never commissioned. Still what we could see of the main chapel was incredible. The mosaic and inlay work of the colored marble and stones is absolutely incredible. A single table or dish would be beautiful. An entire room is absolutely breathtaking.
Of course the highlights for Silas we the old fashioned elevator in the apartment building, the drinking fountain outside the Duomo, the train, bus, and airplane rides, the ice cream, and being with Mom, Dad, and Emmet for four solid days.