It's the Leaning Tower of Pisa!! ...Wait that's it??

I spent last weekend in Florence and then we took a quick trip to Pisa on Sunday before heading back to Rome. I went with 6 other girls, 3 of my roommates and 3 others. We got up early, way too early, on Friday to get to the train station and get to Florence on a fast train by 10 am. We then went to our hostel and found out that we were basically staying in what could have been an apartment. There were two separate bedrooms, one with 5 beds, one with 2. And then there was a living room, a kitchen that wasn't really in working  condition, and a bathroom. So we had a lot of space as compared to a lot of hostels. The hostel was great and the people were very friendly and we met the owner of the property that spoke to us in Italian for a bit (I however did not catch that much of this, but I did get the gist of quite a few things.)

On Friday we then got a reservation for the Uffizi for Saturday and then headed to Galleria Academia to see David. David was incredible, the rest of the museum however was not that spectacular. There was a room with a ton of other statues that was pretty cool and some of the unfinished Michelangelo sculptures were interesting to see because of seeing the work mid process. Other than that nothing noteworthy. After that we saw the Ponte Vecchio, which is the only bridge over the Arno in Florence that survived the Nazis. We also saw that Duomo which is gigantic. And then one of the coolest things we did was climbed to the top of the dome and looked out over Florence; it was an amazing view... that only took 463 steps to get to. Its sightseeing with a work out, that is for sure. After that we just wandered around a bit and then went in a few churches until the awkward time when all the touristy sightseeing places are closed and its not quite time to eat.

For dinner that night we went to a restaurant that was recommended to one of the people we were with for the amazing pear pasta, which is apparently a Florence thing. So of course, I had to try the pear pasta. It was a stuffed pasta (with pear of course) in a mild cheese/cream sauce. It was way better than I ever though combining pear and pasta would be. Definitely a must find if you ever go to Florence.

Saturday, we went to the Uffizi where we were overloaded with art among which was the Birth of Venus. After that we went to Pitti Palace and walked around that Boboli Gardens. After that we went to the leather markets and it was so overwhelming and I had no idea what I would want I just helped my roommate for almost 2 hours find a leather jacket that she finally decided to purchase. It was a lot of fun and I think if I ever go back I will invest in something leather. It was just so overwhelming to know what's real and what's fake and what a good deal is and what isn't a good deal.

Then that night for dinner we had our first experience with apertivo. It is a common Italian thing that we just haven't done in Rome yet. However, we plan to do that soon, maybe tomorrow? It is sort of like American happy hour, but you pay somewhere around 8 euros and that gets you a drink and then they have a buffet. Some are more of an appetizer thing that Italians do before dinner but some have large quantities of food and you basically eat dinner there. It was very interesting food since you can't tell for sure what things are but it was of course good food.

Sunday, we took the train to Pisa, took a bus from the train station and saw the Leaning Tower of Pisa. And let me just say, that is all there is in Pisa. You go you see it, you take pictures, you spend a lot of time setting up the pictures of others "holding up the tower" and then you are done. It was worth it to see for a short time but I am glad that is all the time we planned there.

All in all it was a very successful weekend. I hope to update soon on some of the day to day Rome things and school and such as well as the up coming adventures. Sarah and Hanna come Saturday for the week and I am SO excited!

Ciao!