Well, it turns out that I have a gap in our accommodation. We check out of this place the Artimide Guesthouse today, but our next place is not booked until the 27th, Saturday. That is inconvenient!! I jump onto Hotels.com to try to find something. Everything seems to be $800 and up!! Yikes, this could be an expensive gap! I did reach out to this place and the next place to see if they had a corresponding gap in their bookings. That would work out nicely. Sadly, not to be.
I finally found a hotel quite near to our Saturday booking. More than I wanted to pay, but not $800. We make our way across the town to Hotel Allesandra. It has it’s reception on the 2nd floor, the sign says. Remembering that in Ital, in Europe the ground floor is floor 0, zero! I go up a few stairs and see that after a flight and a half of steps, there is a small elevator. I get myself up to the 2nd (really 3rd) floor receoption. We are very early to check in, we know, but we would like to drop off our bags and go exploring this new section of Florence. He advises that we can definitely bring the bags up in the little elevator. I return to where Lindsey is watching the bags. She lugs my big bag up to the elevator, I grab some of the smaller ones. The elevator can hold our 2 larger bags and me, ONLY. Lindsey hikes up the stairs and reaches the reception at about the same time as I do in the elevator. We check in and leave the bags and off we go.
We reach the Piazzo della Signoria which is very close to our little hotel and our apartment that we get tomorrow. There are lots of people and statues everywhere. We find a little bar at the edge of the Piazzo. We enjoy a spritzer drink along with some complementary snacks. It is a very happening venue with amazing people watching available.
We pay dearly for the complimentary snacks. This is a coveted spot, so the charges are not cheap!!
The Piazzo is very crowded, so we decide to cross the Ponte Vecchio to the other side of the Arno River. There are gardens over on that side of the river. Here is the Ponte Vecchio. The shops on the bridge are all jewelry stores. We hear later that this is because one of the early Grand Duke, Medici didn’t like to see or smell the butcher shops that originally set up shop on the bridge where they could just dump the scraps from their trade into the river to flow down river to be someone else’s problem. So the Grand Duke changed the law so that only jewelry shops could operate on the bridge. Much better aromas going forward.
These photos are basically identical. On one I used my phones “object eraser” to eliminate the cars, people and motor bikes. This tool is incredible.
The Boboli Gardens. Google Maps give us directions. This is not a Cinque Terre hike, but it is mostly up hill. To enter the gardens, is a 10 Euro admission, a very very large property. It has some great view of the City of Florence.
We have logged some serious steps today. We at one point decided to take a bus back to our hotel, but the bus stop was crowded with school children, so we decide to just keep walking. We end up with over 21,000 steps or almost 10K.
We are heading to the hotel and see some very large doors. This one has the door knob so high, it is even difficult for Lindsey to reach!
This is our hotel and room. We even get a complimentary bottle of wine! The staff are amazing. Good choice this morning. Even though the reception is on the 2nd floor, our room is on the 3rd (4th) Lots more steps. Here are also some photo from the Cathedral of Santa Maria dei Fiore. THE CATHEDRAL of Florence. The Bell Tower is also amazing.
We have our dinner at a small restaurant with a patio. I have ravioli and Lindsey enjoys some risotto. Love the sign with Scrumbled Eggs!
On our way home we hear some smooth jazz playing. There is a band playing in a square, that during the day holds many market stalls. The acoustics are amazing. We contribute to the kitty. Lovely music in this lovely city.
The end to another amazing day.