Day One: Florence

I took this picture of the boys on Easter Sunday - our first full day in Italy. After 24 hours of traveling, we were grateful to lay our bodies down and rest. I think most of us slept in that first day, though quite a few of us confessed waking up in the middle of the night and having a hard time falling back to sleep. I believe the time change was hitting us. Thankfully, it didnt take long to adjust to Italy. Once we were all awake, we ate breakfast together and discussed the day's agenda. It was a cold morning with lots of clouds on the horizon. The bells were ringing all over the valley on account of the Easter holiday and despite the fact that we didnt know if anything would be open, we all agreed to drive into Florence.

Florence was a 30 minute drive from Capezzana. We set out in two cars with five people in each vehicle, but caravaning on Italian streets is tricky. Its easy to get separated and lost. The streets in Italy are narrow and they dont often go in straight lines. Italians drive fast and weave in and out of traffic without fear or trepidation. There are traffic circles which take some getting used to and kamikaze vespa motorists that pop up from out of nowhere. The driving experience rivals a challenging video game, but Matt enjoyed navigating the streets and so did my sister's fiance, Chris. Getting from one place to another proved nauseating to those of us who were easily carsick, but thanks to our drivers we always arrived at our destination unscathed. When we reached Florence it was surprising to see so many people out and about. Despite the holiday, everything appeared to be open and the city was buzzing with activity.

The city's center is a short walk from the train station and the first landmark we found ourselves in front of was the Medici Chapel. Previous to our trip, my mother and I both read a couple books on the MedicI family. It seemed opportune that our first place of interest in Florence would be the chapel of their great family and the location of the tombs. We stopped for a few seconds to get a couple pictures of the chapel and continued into the open market that surrounds the church.


Entering the market, I sensed something was wrong. The majority of our group was lagging behind and when we circled back to find them, we were met with the realization that somewhere in front of the Medici chapel my mother was pick pocketed. The culprits took off with her credit cards and US drivers license so for the next hour or so, my mom was on her cell phone trying to cancel her credit cards. Im pretty sure that the picture above was taken seconds after the crime occurred. My mom is the one with the purple scarf and her hand feeling around towards her pocket. After we realized what had happened, many of us understood that we too felt the same bumps and rustling that fostered my mom's theft. Fortunately, the thieves didnt find anything in our purses or pockets that was valuable. For the rest of the trip Matt stuck a small Rick Steves phrase book in his back pocket as a decoy for anyone trying to pick pocket him. ha ha


The theft didnt rain on our parade, even when the actual clouds did. We spent most of the day taking in all the popular walking sights in on again/off again rainy weather. The Duomo. The Ponte Vecchio. The Piazza della Signoria. Mercato Nuovo/Il Porcellino. Piazza della Republica. We had a nice lunch right off the Piazza della Signoria in a pizzeria called El Bargello. The pizza was just ok, but the beers we received there were HUMONGOUS. They were very refreshing after a days worth of walking. We also savored our first taste of Italian gelato in Florence. Oh man.... it was soooooo good. Finn is a very picky eater and I had to convince him to try it. He didnt want to taste it! I explained to him that while gelato is technically ice cream, its not. Its better than ice cream! Once Finn tried my raspberry flavored gelato, he was hooked and had quite a few cups during the trip.


Just a side note: During our first day, Matt bought Seamus a leather jacket in Florence. Seamus was really hoping to get one so while my mom was calling around trying to cancel her credit cards, Matt took Seamus into the same leather shop where he bought a leather jacket three years before. He ended up picking out the one in the following picture.

For the rest of our Italian vacation, Seamus wore that jacket everywhere we went. By our second or third day, he had accessorized his leather jacket with the page boy hat. During our stay, he would often ask me "Mama, do I look Italian?" and Id tell him yes. I swear, he looked like some little Italian character out of a film. So cute.

Happy Monday.