We spent two days in Florence, and on the first evening, after dinner, Bill and I wandered back to the Piazza degli Uffizi and by chance caught a street performer singing with his guitar in the corner of the square. The acoustics there were remarkable, and you could hear his for blocks around. Here's a pic (I know it's really dark, and his spotlight played havoc with my flash, but I think you'll get a little sense of the atmosphere):
Here's a little better night shot of one of the streets running up from the Piazza to the Duomo:
The next day was entirely free until dinner, without any guided tours. Upon waking up, I discovered our room had a little balcony. Here's the view of the Arno River across the street from our hotel:
Here's another shot of the river from the park above its banks, a couple blocks down from the hotel (looking east):
I eventually walked up through a farmer's market and made my way over to the Academy Art Gallery, where Michaelangelo's David is housed. I don't have any pictures of that, because it wasn't allowed, but following that I went over to the Monastery de San Marco, which was adjacent to the Academy across the square. This was a pretty neat place. Each of the "cells" for the monks had a picture painted onto the wall by a Renaissance artist named Beato Angelico (again, sorry there are no photos). This was the monastery from which Savonorola launched his political and religious takeover of Florence, which apparently was as bloody as the Spanish Inquisition. Some of the Medici family followed the orders there as well (and had noticeably fancier digs than the run-of-the-mill monks). It's also one of the places where they produced illuminated holy books, and I was able to go through the studio and see lots of examples of their work. Here's a picture of the garden in the center of the courtyard of the monastery:
And a closeup of one of the paintings done in the archways under the canopy surrounding the courtyard (also, I think, by Beato):
After that, I wandered over to the central market and then headed to meet Bill for lunch. The next post will have some shots from that afternoon and evening.
Here's a little better night shot of one of the streets running up from the Piazza to the Duomo:
The next day was entirely free until dinner, without any guided tours. Upon waking up, I discovered our room had a little balcony. Here's the view of the Arno River across the street from our hotel:
Here's another shot of the river from the park above its banks, a couple blocks down from the hotel (looking east):
I eventually walked up through a farmer's market and made my way over to the Academy Art Gallery, where Michaelangelo's David is housed. I don't have any pictures of that, because it wasn't allowed, but following that I went over to the Monastery de San Marco, which was adjacent to the Academy across the square. This was a pretty neat place. Each of the "cells" for the monks had a picture painted onto the wall by a Renaissance artist named Beato Angelico (again, sorry there are no photos). This was the monastery from which Savonorola launched his political and religious takeover of Florence, which apparently was as bloody as the Spanish Inquisition. Some of the Medici family followed the orders there as well (and had noticeably fancier digs than the run-of-the-mill monks). It's also one of the places where they produced illuminated holy books, and I was able to go through the studio and see lots of examples of their work. Here's a picture of the garden in the center of the courtyard of the monastery:
And a closeup of one of the paintings done in the archways under the canopy surrounding the courtyard (also, I think, by Beato):
After that, I wandered over to the central market and then headed to meet Bill for lunch. The next post will have some shots from that afternoon and evening.
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