Eurotrip 2010: Florence and Venice

Sorry I have not been updating the blog recently but I just now feel like I have really recovered from the whirlwind pace of the trip. I will try and post about the rest of the trip over the next few days.

After Thor presented his work at CIRP on Monday he hopped a train for Florence in the morning. we spent the train trip seated next to a couple who alternated between yelling at someone on the speaker phone in some foreign language that i did not recognize (i.e. Not Italian) and blasting what sounded like polish folk music on their cell phone. It turns out that loudly playing music in public on your cell phone is a very popular thing to do in Europe. I don't know how many preteen girls I saw blasting Miley Cyrus on the speaker of their cell phones. Anyway when we arrived in Florence we checked into our hotel room which was across from the Duomo.

Thor in front of the Duomo in Florence

The inside of the Duomo.

The church was not open yet but the dome was so we decided to climb it.

Thor climbing through the narrow passages of the dome.

It was a long tough climb but it was well worth it.

Me at the top of the Duomo overlooking Florence.

After we got down from the dome we decided to walk around the city a bit. We stopped by the Ponte Vecchio which is a medieval bridge over the Arno river in Florence which is filled with shops.

Me in front of the Ponte Vecchio.

Then we stopped by the Uffizi museum where he had 1pm reservations. By making reservations in advance we were able to skip two hour line and get directly into the museum. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures in the museum.

The Uffizi.

Me from the porch of the Uffizi looking at the Duomo.

After the Uffizi we headed up to the Galleria dell' Accademia home of the David. The David turned out to be much bigger and more impressive than I thought it would be. Again we were not allowed to take pictures but Thor has seemed to prefect the art of taking sneak shots at museums.

Thor's stealth shot of the David.

After dinner and a few bottles of wine we headed up to the Piazza de Michelangelo which has an amazing view of Florence.  The piazza is also home to the third of the three Davids in Florence (the real one in the Galleria dell' Accademia plus the replicas at the David's original home outside the Uffizi and in the Piazza de Michelangelo).  Thus we were able to complete our David trifecta.

View of Florence from the Piazza de Michelangelo.

After we made it down from the piazza we had desert and a few more bottles of wine. Then we walked past a bar called the red garter and decided to go in. The bar seemed to be playing exclusively American top 40 music but there were a lot of people dancing so we decided to go in. I don't know if there were any actual Italian people there since we spent most of the time chatting up two cute German girls but I had a lot of fun anyway. We did however drink much more than we should of given that we had to get up early and rent a car to drive to Venice early in the morning.

Thanks to our late night out in Florence I was not doing well by the time we got to car rental agency on Wednesday morning. Fortunately everything went smoothly with the car rental and we hit the road over the Tuscan hills to Venice. Climbing the hills outside Florence was really very beautiful.

Thor in the hills of Tuscany.

We arrived in Venice in the early afternoon, parked the car and took a water bus into the city.

View of Venice from the water bus.

Venice is truly a unique and beautiful city with canals for streets and water everywhere.

One of the many canals in Venice.

First we stopped by the Piazza di San Marco and took a look at Saint Mark’s basicalla.

Thor in the Piazza di San Marco.

I tried to convince Thor to climb the clock tower but he was having none of it until we realized that it had an elevator which satisfied my desire to see the city from high up and his desire not to climb stairs.

View from the clock tower of the Piazza di San Marco.

View of Venice from the clock tower.

View of the entrance to the Grand Canal.

We spent most of the rest of the day and night walking around the city getting lost in the narrow alleys and admiring the canals.

Thor from the Ponte di Rialto

Flooding outside Saint Mark's Basicalla as the tide came in.

The canals by night.

In the morning we took another water bus out of the city and hit the road for Austria.

View from the water bus as we left Venice.

Eurotrip 2010: Rome and Pisa

I first want to say how disappointed I have been by Eehern's lack of postings about his road trip on this blog. As far as I know Eehern never made it past Detroit. To try and make up for Eehern's shortcomings, I have decided to post some pictures from my and Thor's trip to Italy. We both flew into Rome on Saturday and immediately went to the Vatican since it is closed on Sundays.

St. Peter’s Basilica from Piazza San Pietro

 First we went to the Vatican Museum to see the Sistine Chapel.

Thor sneakily taking a picture of himself in the Sistine Chapel since photos are not allowed in the Chapel

Then I convinced Thor it would be fun to climb the 320 steps necessary to get to the top of St. Peter's Basilica. About half way up Thor realized this was not a fun climb through the narrow passages of the Basilica dome and started dropping behind.

Thor climbing the steps to the top of St. Peter's Basilica

Eventually we both made it to the top and it was well worth it. 

Me at the top of St. Peter's Basilica looking down at Piazza San Pietro

After we climbed down, we went into the Basilica where Thor had me take this picture of him holding up his grandmother’s rosary beads for proof they had been to the Vatican.

Thor in St. Peter's Basilica holding his grandmother's rosary beads

We then headed over to the Pantheon which is one of the best preserved ancient buildings in Rome.

Me walking towards the Pantheon

From the Pantheon we walked to the Trevi Fountain and tossed a coin in for good luck.

Thor at the Trevi Fountain

We concluded the day by relaxing on the Spanish Steps

Me at the Spanish Steps

After a night out enjoying the roman nightlife, we headed over to the Colosseum. 

Colosseum and Roman Forum

Me at the Colosseum

From the Colosseum we explored the Roman Forum and climbed Palatine Hill.

Me at the top of Palatine Hill with the Roman Forum and the Colosseum

We then hoped a train for Pisa and the CIRP conference where we are now. Before the conference started we were able to climb the 296 steps to the top of the leaning tower though Thor was a bit hesitant after his experience at the Basilica.

Leaning Tower of Pisa

View of the Duomo and Baptistery from the top of the Leaning Tower

Thor at the top of the leaning tower

This may be the last update for a while because I do not know when I will have the internet and time to write again, but I will try and keep the updates coming.