May 2, 2025 - Florence

 We slept in a little bit today and then we spend most of the morning trying to find a place near Cinque Terre! Good luck!

Today we will drive to Florence, but we don’t get away until after 1 o’clock. We found a parking spot about 1.2 km from the cathedral, but by the time we get deep into the city, the crowds have really increased. We didn’t make any reservations to go into the cathedral and the lineup for no reservations is so long that we decide that we probably don’t need to see another cathedral even though this is the largest one in the world. Lol. The outside of the buildings are being restored so on most of the exterior of the cathedral, it’s cloaked  

Richard had promised to climb the 463 steps in the Duomo but now he’s off the hook.

Everywhere you look or walk or drive it’s wall to wall people, tourists, no doubt. I don’t mind it, but I could see how you could get sick of it too.

A little bit of spaghetti carbonara for lunch

Evrtone needs that shot, right?

Some cool water to cool the poor guy down

I can’t believe how cool it is when you enter these massive buildings. What a refuge!!

This sat on the altar of the church and Richard told me it was a consecrated host

The Arno river and the Ponte Vecchio

Statues everywhere you look.

We leave the hustle and bustle of Florence and return to our quiet apartment andfind a place for dinner. There is a sushi restaurant, not far and within walking distance. It was very good.