A Trip to Remember

Have no fear! I almost forgot to update tonight, but, alas, I have remembered. Lucky you.

The tomb of Dante Alighieri. Sadly, his body isn't there because of a political fallout while he was alive.

So what did I do today? That's a very good question. For the first time since I've arrived, I didn't have Italian.  Both a good and a bad thing. Instead, we had a class on Italian culture and history. We had a theoretical background of what we were going to do in the afternoon -- a two part class. Venturing down into Florence, we visited the Duomo and the Baptistery. Francesco, our guide, was fantastic and gave us the incredible history of Florence. The picture above is from the Cathedral of Santa Croce (Holy Cross). It houses some of the greatest minds Florence had the honor of birthing. Galileo Galilee, Niccolo Machiavelli, Michaelangelo, and, as pictured above, Dante Alighieri. It's hard to fathom how many great minds came from this one city, but it's absolutely awesome at the same time.

We saw beautiful art all afternoon, even if it was a little bit chilly.

The crucifix made by Donatello.

I felt honored to be in the presence of two Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles today.

Heroes in a half-shell... TURTLE POWER!

Ok, now that I've got my geekdom out of the way, we can continue to the rest of my night. No, really, no more 90s references. At least I don't think I'll have anymore. *shrug*

Anywho! We came back to Settignano through the Chocolate Festival, where they were giving out free samples of various chocolate liquors. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in town today. Of course, there's still a lot for me to do in Florence, since I still have yet to find a shoe store that will actually sell me shoes for less than €90.

This is the Cathedral I was talking about earlier with all the paintings and tombs. The Chocolate Festival are the tens to the right.

Oh! But my Spring Break has officially been booked. Or at least the first part of it. We fly out of Pisa on Saturday March, 5, to Hamburg, Germany. We will spend one night there since it will be quite late when our plane finally lands. In the morning we will take a bus to Berlin and spend two nights there. From that juncture, our group will split into two. Three will go int Poland, and David and I will head further South into Germany. We will hit Nuremberg and Munich before we take a train across Austria to Vienna. I'm really looking forward to it and glad that I will be able to see a country I have always wanted to visit.

One more thing! My Florence album in the top right will be updated with all the pictures I have taken in Florence. So you might want to check that album every now and again to see if I've added anything. In the past few days I've added seventy or more photos.

I think that's all for tonight, though. God bless!