Italy Part 7: Florence - Palazzo Vecchio

The Palazzo Vecchio is a huge old palace in Florence. The Medici family used to live there, and many of their enemies swung from the tower with a noose around their necks!

The Palazzo Vecchio

The great hall on the second floor

The paintings in the Great Hall were enormous!


The ceiling


Stairs

A cherub

The blue room - check out the ceiling!

The ceiling

Random works of art

Floor details

Freaky face on a wall

The Map Room
In the center is a very large globe

Globe

And on the walls are many old maps.
I particularly liked this one of eastern Africa.
See the elephant?


Above the elephant it says,
"This region produces many elephants"!

The view on exiting the Palazzo.
That's a copy of Michelangelo's David,
in the place where it (the original) stood
for 300 years before being moved indoors.

Italy Part 6: Florence - The Bike Tour

On the Saturday that we were in Florence, we went on a bike tour. The company picked us up in downtown Florence and drove us about 45 minutes southwest out into the countryside near a village called Poppiano. Poppiano has a castle and a Count, and has since at least the 1200s!

These days, the current Count and his family run a winery and olive-oil making facility in their castle.

The castle

Castle courtyard

The castle shop

The most flavorful, delicious olive oil I've ever tasted!
I was able to bring a small bottle of it home with me in my carry-on 1-quart zip lock bag.

Olive press

Their wine was good, too, though I didn't bring any of that home.

More casks

Lots and lots of wine!
(Gus is normal-sized in this photo; it's the cask that's the wrong size!)


The view from the castle tower

After the wine and olive oil tasting and tour of the castle, our tour guides put us on bicycles and led us on a 13-mile bike ride in the surrounding countryside.

Vineyards

More vineyards, with olive groves on the far right hill

The local scenery

The whole excursion (van ride, castle tour, biking, lunch, more biking, and the van ride back to Florence) took about 7 hours. It was a very fun but exhausting day!

Italy Part 5: Florence - Around Town

Here are various photos I took in Florence.

This photo was taken from our apartment window.
This man sat in that chair every day,
looking out over the river - he had a great view of Ponte Vecchio.
All day he would paint the view and sell the paintings to passersby.

Zoomed-in view
I bought two paintings from him.

Another artist!

Tiny cars! I would love to have one of these for driving to work and back.

Cheese and olives at that central market

A whole shop just for pasta!

Mailboxes in a quiet neighborhood on the other side of the river

The view of the east end of the city from the other side of the river.

Gus in front of the doors to the Pitti Palace

The old city wall

Italy Part 4: Florence - The Duomo

Florence's skyline is dominated by the Duomo, a 14th century cathedral in the heart of the old city. It is massive, and it's nearly impossible to get the whole thing in one picture!

l-r: Baptistery, Duomo (well, the top of the dome, anyway), and tower

The bell tower

Evening at the Duomo

Side view

The front is so ornate!

The doors

An old man carved into the door

The dome. See the people near the top? We climbed up there.
It was something like 460 steps up a narrow spiral staircase.

The view!

Italy Part 3: Florence - The River

After Cinque Terre, we took the train to Florence (or, Firenze, as the Italians say). We stayed there for five nights and saw many beautiful sites!

The Arno river runs east-to-west through Florence. We stayed in a 5th floor apartment right at the north end of the Ponte Vecchio, a bridge which was built in 1345.

Here's the view from one of our windows:

That long white "building" in the center is the Ponte Vecchio.
This was taken facing southwest-ish.

And here's the view of the other side of the river (Oltrarno),
looking to the southeast-ish.

The rest of these were taken from street level:

Looking to the east in the late afternoon.


A church across the river.



Bridges at dusk, taken from two bridges east.

Ponte Vecchio at night (taken from the next bridge west).