Not All of Italy is Bad

Our next stop was Florence. We had a failed attempt at couch surfing in the beginning so our first night was spent in a hostel. I spent most of the night on the phone with my credit card company trying to activate a card so it was a frustrating but successful night, made better by the fact that we bought a whole Panetonne that I nommed on while I was on hold. Panetonne is a lovely European Christmas cake that comes in a trapezoidal box and is sold in every grocery store. It is packed with dry fruit but is not as dense as a fruit cake. As our time in Europe is coming to a close, we have been trying to sample all of the food that is "classic" European and this certainly counts as one of them.

Seeing the Cathadrale Santa Maria at night was probably my favorite thing we did in all of Florence. We turned the corner while looking for dinner one night and there it was. Quite honestly, it looks fake. It looks like it is a set for a play, a mere facade that will tumble with the slightest weight. I cannot even describe to you the surrealness of it because in pictures it looks real. In person however it is so impressive and decorated that your brain has no choice but to believe it is being tricked.

I said that the Cathadrale was my favorite thing but I might have to take that back. Why? Because I love food. We had in Florence my favorite meal on this trip so far. We went to Da Ganino, a place described on trip advisor as perfect for "a tired travelor who wants a great meal at a reasonable place to rest your head for the next day." And it was just that. It was dimly lit with a warm and cosy atmosphere and exactly what we needed. Their ravioli was indeed to die for, picture this: potato ravioli with pumpkin cream sauce in sage butter sprinkled with amaretto. And meatballs stewed in cinnamon and covered in homemade marinara sauce. That's right, be jealous. To top it off we finished with a heavenly cheesecake with fresh cut strawberries. Everything about the meal was perfect.

Florence as a whole however, was a fairly uneventful city for me. Sick to death of paying for famous sites, I opted out of seeing Michelangelo's David and going to the museum Uffizi. Instead I spent my time wandering the streets of Florence and frequenting various bookstores to read. Alexis assured me that David was an impressive site and I have no doubt that it was, but along our travels I've realized that in general I prefer wandering a city to paying to see sites that people tell me are famous and fabulous. Not to say I don't like museums, I like them too, but with only so much time in each city I prefer to see the streets. The streets are especially fabulous now because almost every window display is decorated for Christmas. We won't get much of a Christmas atmosphere in India so this is it for us.

I suppose not all of Florence was boring. An epic, wonderful, life altering event has happened! That's right folks! Put it in your calendars, tell it to your neighbors, we bought our flights home! We will be gracing the US with our presence on March 21st! In addition to that we purchased our flights to Nepal, Bangkok and Tokyo! It only took an hour on the phone in a cafe and a considerable sum of money but we did it. Now if we can just get through Europe...

Cheers,

Liz