This morning I enjoyed a quiet cup (ok…two cups) of cappuccino at a café across from our hotel. The woman there – the owner, I assume – was so friendly. I loved sitting there watching the people stroll by…some tourists, some locals. It was early enough that the city’s routine workers were starting their daily activities. Trash pick-up is obviously first thing Tuesday morning, shops received deliveries of food and other goods, and there were workers setting up scaffolding to work on restorations of the historical buildings. It was a nice slice of Florentine life, mixed in with a bit of tourist life…but mostly I enjoyed the solitude from my family.

My husband and I toured Il Duomo (only 2 minutes walk from our hotel) in the morning, walking the 154 steps up to the dome, and then continuing up the additional 300+ steps to the very top. Stunning views from here!! Rather than wait in the looooong line to enter the church, we elected to pay for the guided tour. It was a deal and saved so much time. Plus, we were able to see parts of the dome and church only open to those doing the tour. I highly recommend it.

We grabbed a quick bite to eat before meeting up with a guide (Marco Secci) to tour the Uffici museum, a 2 minute walk in the other direction from our hotel, then headed to see ‘David’ after that…amazing! Our guide was one of the best we have encountered. I made sure to get his business card so we can use him again when we go back to Florence. And yes, we do plan to return one day to see all the things we didn’t get a chance to visit.

Marco suggested yet another local place for dinner; also right around the corner from our hotel (I should mention we had a phenomenal hotel location!). After dinner we headed on a walk past Ponte Vecchio to one of the De Medici castles open for a late-night visit. My husband and I toured for a bit…amazing to see how grand some folks lived! It was a nice night and we enjoyed our walk back through town to the hotel. Florence is a beautiful city, well worth the visit. Hopefully we will have the opportunity to return.

Today was more of a recovery day…we took it easy, strolling around Florence’s street markets and checking out the historical buildings/landmarks. We had lunch atop a restaurant overlooking Ponte Vecchio, and then we walked a bit more in the afternoon. It was nice to have a low-key day to unwind from all of the constant activity we had been experiencing.

We were directed to a different restaurant for dinner – another typical Florence-style eatery. Our waiter was phenomenal and funny, patient with us as we practiced speaking our minimal Italian. At the end of dinner a man popped into the restaurant dressed in renaissance attire and recited a portion of Dante’s ‘Inferno’ (in Italian of course). It was quite beautiful and was a fabulous way to end the meal!!

My husband and I toured Verona in the morning, leaving the boys after breakfast since they had no desire to join us. Our first stop was the coliseum in Verona…it is smaller than the one in Rome, but it is much more intact. In fact, it is still used for concerts and other large venues to this day. The very top tier is the only one not still in place due to an earthquake way back when…

Next, we did a walking tour (a la Rick Steves) through the center area of town. We strolled through streets and alleys, stopping at a pastry shop for some cookies, continuing on past the main square and past a couple of churches. We eventually ended up by the river and walked along it for a short time on the way back to the hotel to meet up with our sons.

The afternoon was a bit of a disappointment. The concierge had suggested a drive to Lake Gardo where we could view the lake and mountains. However, once we drove out there we found that it was crowded and there were not a lot of available places to park. We figured we’d just drive around and view the scenery instead, but found there really was no place to pull over to take photos, and the roads were not conducive to seeing the sights…what we did see was spectacular, and I would love to return one day when we have more time and can have someone explain how to best get around the area.

We continued on to Parma from Lake Gardo where we had dinner. Our little adventure of the day involved winging it to get there, finding out there are many zones non-locals are not allowed to cross via car (and they offer steep fines if you do cross those zones, so hopefully we avoided them all…), and finally locating a place to park. By the time we went through all of this we were starving! We did not get the tour of downtown Parma that I had hoped for, but we did have a great meal before heading back to Verona…including gnocchi for me (best I’ve had).  Perhaps the day didn’t go as planned, but it still had a nice ending!

Yet another travel adventure awaited us today (actually two…read on until the end…). We set off for Venice in the morning after my husband walked to the train station early to buy our tickets. However, when we all walked over at the designated time to catch our train we saw the word ‘soppresso’ where the track number should have been. We quickly learned this was Italian for ‘cancelled’. Since we were meeting a guide for a tour of Venice we were in a bit of a time crunch. The information line was not long, and we garnered that in these situations you just hop on the next train and hope there is a spot available…not the ideal situation for us since we had paid extra for 1^st class seats and were not now guaranteed seating at all (together or otherwise) in either 1^st or coach…and no refunds offered! A bit of an unorganized operation…Fortunately we were all able to find a stray seat here and there in 1^st once we were on the train (uh, the next train…), and we only arrived in Venice about 45 minutes later than planned, and still in time to meet our guide at the pre-arranged time. So in the end it was more of a learning experience. Yep, that’s what I’m going with on this…

Venice is magical…I just loved the sights as we rolled into our stop! There are water buses, water taxis and gondolas waiting as you exit the station…we chose a water taxi to take us to Piazza San Marco where we were meeting our guide. Our taxi wound through the canal, giving us ample time to take photos along the way. Upon docking we found a quick bite to eat to tide us over…

We met ‘Guiliana’, our guide…a wonderful Italian lady from Venice who has been giving tours for over 20 years. She grew up here, and although she no longer lives in Venice, she still owns a house here…which is now vacant. Apparently this is common these days because the upkeep to maintain these homes is expensive.

Guiliana took us through San Marco Square first, giving us a basis in the town’s rich history and guiding us through the church of San Marco. This is a busy, touristy area, quite crowded this time of year. We were able to avoid the long lines since she is an approved guide…very helpful and time-effective!

Next, we headed off the beaten path. Once we left the main area it was not crowded at all, and we were given a tour of the town she grew up in and knows so well. We stopped for a bite to eat at a wonderful restaurant where we ate their fish special of the day…a triple play selection including flounder, sea bass and some other white fish…all steamed and served with a very light tomato sauce, olives and potatoes. It was supposed to be a light snack, but our waiter was the ultimate convincer, especially after serving us an aperitif of Aperol (an Italian liqueur) mixed with Prosecco…who could resist???

Then it was back to the streets/alleys/canals of Venice to finish off our tour. We left Guiliana and strolled a bit more on our own, stopping at a wine bar when we needed a rest. Sitting outside we people-watched as we slowly sipped our wine and water. Refreshed, we continued on to the train station to head back into Verona.

This brings us to the ‘Hindsight is 20/20’ Thought of the Day: When taking the train, verify your stop before you exit the train. It was late and we were eager to get back to our hotel and rest up for the next day. We saw ‘Verona’ listed as the next stop, but did not verify it was the stop we needed. Yes, you guessed it: it was the wrong stop. We soon found ourselves in the less-touristy area of Verona. Just another side note: in Italy you cannot just hail a taxi off the street…by law, you must either find a taxi stand (we could not locate one) or actually call a company to send a taxi (we had no number/name of a company to call). We did not feel comfortable asking for directions (didn’t want to tip anyone off that we were lost tourists, even though we were obviously tourists, and obviously lost) but we finally found a pizza place that was kind enough to call a taxi for us. So we had our second train adventure in the space of 24 hours…ah, what is yet to come??? J