My people forgave me for denying them that much needed 15 minutes of sleep. My day had a bit of a rough start. When I put my backpack through the metal detector, my water bottle popped open and poured into my bag. When I picked it up, it started pouring onto the floor. Shit. Sam wisely suggested I hold it over the trash can but i had already created a water hazard and perhaps even an International Incident. Before the injuries began to pile up, we quickly darted into the museum. I loved being in the Accademia early. We pretty much had David to ourselves for a blessed 20 minutes before the crowds literally came pouring in. He is the definition of "worth the price of admission." After the Rick Steves tour of the Accademia, we had a street breakfast, including cappuccino for Sam and Tony. I chuckled at the silly cups, non coffee-drinker that I am.
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| Florence's lovely Duomo. |
Next we visited the Duomo (impressive) and then climbed the Duomo (really tough less than two days after our Siena climb, but SO worth it. The views were sweeping and spectacular. And the breezes were amazing on a very warm, but gorgeous day.
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| Sam loses her mind in the Mercado Centrale. |
Our next stop was Mercado Centrale, where Sam and Claire nearly had seizures from excitement over amazing food. I am not a foodie, but even I thoroughly enjoyed wandering the aisles of the mercado, which were filled with different foods of impressive quality. Eventually Syd and Tony (who managed to get lost even though the mercado was only two blocks from our apartment) and we made our own alfresco picnic. Wonderful!
Our time was quickly slipping away, so we headed to the Arno to visit Ponte Vecchio, which was crawling with tourists, but still managed to be lovely. Next the street market, where we each found an item to treasure. Mine was a bel cappella, which I have been wanting since I arrived. It's adorable.
All too soon (again) we had to pack up. We dropped our luggage with our landlord and had one final bicchieri de vino rosso in our neighborhood before climbing aboard the train to Napoli. Train to Napoli was in first class and womderful. I love the trains here. About 2.5 hours later we arrived in Napoli and our perspectives shifted very rapidly. We had to switch from our fabulous Trentalia line to the Circumvesuviana, which services areas below Naples. Hellish. When the train arrived, an enormous mass of humanity was bound and determined to force themselves onto already packed cars. I was undeterred and literally jammed myself, Claire, and Syd into one car, luggage (piled up) included. Tony and Sam decided to try the next car, where we promptly lost sight of them for more than an hour. Ironically, while Sam and Tony didn't think they could cram into our car, plenty of others did. For the next three or four stops (did I mention there were about 30?) no one got off, but at least 5 or 6 more people got on.
We were literally mashed flat against other people and it was about 300 degrees. I knew the girls were miserable, and literally dripping with sweat, but they didn't complain once. Sydney couldn't reach the bar so I told her to hold on to me. But honestly, if that train had come to a screeching halt, she wouldn't have moved since she was packed in like a sardine. After about 20 minutes, people started getting off and I eyed a back corner where I thought we might be able to stash our suitcases. A wonderful man saw me looking and basically made room for us, and directed people to move around so we could crawl back with all of our stuff and even get two seats. It was so generous. I was touched. Once we sat down, I braided the girls super sweaty hair to try to help them cool off a bit. Then they whipped out their itouches and were perfectly happy for the rest of the ride.
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| View from our terrace in Sorrento. Jaw-dropping. |
As we circumnavigated the Bay of Naples we were able to view a gorgeous sunset just before arriving in Sorrento (technically Sant'Agnello) where our landlord had arranged a car to pick us up. We took a five-minute, basically straight uphill drive to our little slice of heaven - the apartamento Agave. Our landlord was attempting to show us around, but we could barely pay attention because we couldn't take our eyes off the view. The apartment is lovely, but the main selling point is the huge terrace where we basically have spent every moment so far. The view of the town, the Bay of Naples, "Vesuvio," and even Naples are simply jaw-dropping. When night fell, I stood outside and nearly cried at how pretty it was. The stars came out and completed the tableau. Actually, splitting a bottle of Chianti with Sam and Tony completed the tableau.
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