Italy day 15 - Getting our feet under us in Florence

Today was a day to get acquainted with the city. We started with a Rick Steves' audio tour. His tours are a bit quirky, but they're very informational and the Florence Renascence tour was a good intro to why Florence is so important to modern culture.

We basically fell out of our hotel onto the front steps of the Duomo and then worked our way to the Palazzo Vecchio and then onto the Ponte Vecchio. It was good to see that not much has changed since I was here in my 20s. If nothing else because it makes it easier to find my way. ;)

We ducked into a couple of minor churches along the way and ended up at the Central Market for lunch and some sweets. I always recommend visiting markets while travelling because it gives you a good idea of what's locally in season and what you should be eating. The strawberries and artichokes look amazing right now!

Tonight we decided to embrace the Florentine appertivo culture. Somehow I managed to find a hipster coffee bar/bar-bar, Ditta Artigianale, that wouldn't be out of place in Seattle or Oregon. Now, as much as I might poke fun, the drinks were fantastic!

From there we headed to Trattoria Cammillo for bisteak Florentine with white beans and artichokes. All I can say is they know how to do steak in this city! Well, that and we didn't order an antipasti or a primi because we rightly figured that the steak and contorni would be plenty filling. However I think our waiter thought we were going to wither away and starve before our meal arrived. He assured us no fewer than three times that the food was, in deed, on it's way. To be fair though, I'm sure they get a lot of American diners who are less than thrilled with the more laid back approached to dining in Europe.

On the way back from dinner, we stopped by the cinghiale or wild boar statue that, like many fountains, is supposed to bring you good luck if you drop a coin just right. In this case, you slide the coin into the boar's mouth to let it drop. If it falls through a certain slot, you get good luck. If not, I'm assuming you get gored by a boar on your next hike through Tuscany. Kris' coin dropped correctly on the second attempt, so he'll be hiking alone on our next trip!

Tomorrow we hit the Boboli Gardens, a place I'm sorry to report that I missed the first time I was here. Hopefully the weather holds as they are predicting thunderstorms. :/