European Tour: Florence, Italy

After making our way from the train station to Hotel Olympia, we were pretty worn out. The hotel was on the top floor of a building, and the elevator space was small (as already pointed out before: European elevators are not the same as American ones). So some of us were tired from lugging our bags up flights of stairs. People got unpacked and ready to go sight-seeing in Florence. 

Hotel Olympia in Florence

I'm not sure why I wait so long to get the idea to take pictures of the hotel rooms, but I did in Florence. The top picture is a view of our hotel from the square. In the top right is a picture of our bathroom. That's right, the shower head came directly out of the wall and you stood in the middle of the bathroom to take a shower...someone even bashed their head on the sink (attempting to get their shampoo) forgetting that it wasn't a normal shower. The first picture on the bottom is the set up of the beds, and the last picture is the rest of the room, a little desk and TV included. The only thing we ever really watched on TV with MTV (insert name of country we were in). The rest of the channels were in the national language of the country and at least MTV played music videos sometimes.

The David

After unpacking, G-Rod got us all together to head out to see Accademia di Belle Arti - Academy of Fine Arts. This is where Michelangelo's David is housed. You're technically not supposed to take pictures (so all the signs say) but I pretended to be a "stupid tourist" and was able to snap a picture before being told off by a guard. So here he is, David in all his glory. The building also housed some really weird paintings representing baby Jesus and the Virgin Mary. It wasn't the nice images you see in most Christian stories but gothic and skinny and creepy, really. So we quickly made our way out of there and decided to do some shopping.

Florence is known for its Mercato Centrale. Where vendors line up on either side of the road and offer you "the best price, just for you" on anything you could think to want. Leather jackets, boots, coats, knock off Coach purses and Ray Ban sunglasses. One of the most interesting things to watch is the tactics of the policemen as they try to sneak up on the African men who are trying to sell the illegal goods. It's a sight to see when 20 men all of a sudden realize they're about to be arrested. They throw everything in their suitcase and run...sometimes they miss something, and you'll see a passerby scoop up the extra pair of sunglasses and run away.

DSP

While we were walking through the market, we actually ran into a guy who was wearing a DSP sweatshirt. Delta Sigma Pi (DSP) is a co-ed business fraternity that Kathryn, Megan and I were a part of...and we got really excited to see another person all the way in Europe rocking the letters. So of course, we had to take a picture with him.

The next day, my little group of friends made our way to a famous sight in Florence. Il Duomo, another church...but a very pretty one at that. As you can see from the pictures, it has a pretty architectural design. We walked around inside for a bit, checking out all the famous dead people that are entombed here. There are a couple of Popes, and a few architects that have a resting place in Il Duomo.

After seeing the Il Duomo, we started to venture down towards the Ponte Vecchio.On our way there, we passed by a festival (there's always some reason to celebrate in Europe) where they were having re-enactments and people were dressed up in period costumes. We hung around for awhile, watching the festivities, but then not knowing what was going on, we finally made our way to the Ponte Vecchio.

The Ponte Vecchio is a famous bridge that was built during Medieval times. It has shops and stores as you walk across the bridge, you can see how the shops hang off the side of the bridge in the picture. There's a lot of jewelry stores, souvenir shops and art dealers that are on the bridge now. At the other side of the bridge is a great Gelato place, we may or may not have eaten there a few times during our 2 day stay :)
 

To be continued...Next Up: European Tour: Milan