Back on the road

Hello again. We are back in Siena now (you'll get the full story later) and we're doing our best to get you all caught up again.

From Orvieto we were reunited with our car, which we decided to name Flash. It was a good feeling to be back driving again. I realized that for myself, the car is the one environmental constant that we have, so it is sort of like home to me.

We had a short drive to Assisi, home to St. Francis and the basilica that honors him. Driving up to the city, you see the basilica on one side and can't help but be impressed by the enormity of it. What is also noticeable, and becomes much more so as you walk through the town is that Assisi is on a large incline, and the whole town sits on the hill sloping from one side to the other. Our hotel room was at the low end of the hill, so sightseeing included a good workout for our legs.

St. Francis was a very interesting man, whose ideas Sara and I really appreciated and respected. He was quite counter-cultural. In those days, since the church was such a political as well as religious institution, being a priest also brought some measure of power and esteem with it. St. Francis intentially eschewed priesthood as he sought to build a "lower brotherhood" of monks who were not part of the priesthood. St. Francis was actually part of the elite growing up, the son of a wealthy fabrics merchant. But he turned his back on all of that, stripping himself naked in front of his father and the town and proclaiming God as his only true father, leaving a privileged lifestyle behind. Franciscan monks all take a vow of poverty as part of their vows. It reminds me of the story of the rich ruler who Jesus asks to sell all his possesions to follow him, except in this story, the ruler obeys and follows Christ. His story was really interesting and inspirational to both me and Sara.

From Assisi we headed off to the cultural mecca of Florence. As opposed to Sara's post on Rome, you will be getting the short version of the sights. Being back in a big city we were again greeted with wonderful Italian city drivers. Thankfully I have no problem practicing offensive rather than defensive driving, so we made it through to our hotel without so much as a honk or dirty look.

Florence is the home to many museums, historical sights, and items of cultural importance. We were feeling a bit burned out after Rome and after being on the road for so long, so we decided to focus on only the two major sights that Sara wanted to see. One was the Michelangelo's sculpture of David, in Galleria dell Accademia, and the other was the Uffizi Gallery, which has a vast collection of paintings including Botticelli's Birth of Venus (the one where Venus is standing in a in the clam shell).

We went to Accademia first and I have to agree, David is really quite impressive. David was sculpted by Michelangelo when he was just 26 years old. He was given a piece of marble that had been ruined by another sculptor, and he was able to create David out of that. Pretty amazing. Here's another note that I didn't realize, and helped me as a non-art savvy person. Many of you art buffs will know that David is not proportionally correct, that is, his head and hands are too large for his body, and his arms are too long. This is because the sculpture was originally meant to be displayed high up, with the viewer situated below. Michelangelo compensated for the fact that the head etc. would be farther away from the viewer than the legs etc, and would thus appear smaller. He made those parts of the body larger so that when viewed as intended, David would appear proportionally accurate. Pretty cool huh? The other startling thing is that the sheer scale and detail on the sculpture. David is huge, standing 17 ft tall (thanks Wikipedia) and Michelangelo captured such details as a vein that is visible running from his bicep down across his forearm (anatomically correct according to Sara). David was something that even I could really appreciate.

After David we made our way down to the Uffizi gallery. I feel obliged to offer a bit of advice for anyone of you ever planning on visiting these sites. Call ahead for reservations. Both Accademia and Uffizi run on a reservations system... else you have to wait in a LONG stand by line and hope for no-shows. Believe me when I say you do not want to do that. Those people did not look like happy campers. With the reservations, getting in was a breeze. Just show up about 10 minutes before your reservation and you are good to go.

Ok... back to Uffizzi. It was certainly an impressive building. It is a huge U-shaped building set right on the Arno river with views of the Ponte Vecchio bridge and the Duomo. We opted for the audio guide here, which at least helped me to see some of the progression in the paintings as we progressed chronologically. The artists' use of both perspective and expressions on the subjects faces grew more sophisticated over time. Sara I'm sure could give you pointers about lots more stuff... she especially enjoyed the aforementioned Botticelli's Venus as well as one of her favorite paintings, his 'Primavera'. I think the one thing that stood out to me was Michelangelo's "Holy Family" (I guess I like Michelangelo.... who knew). In it he depicts Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. But unlike his contemporaries, Mary is much more active and realistic looking, not the stoic and 'angelic' Mary seen in many other works. And the infant Jesus is not just sitting in her lap, but rather is climbing over her shoulder to get to Joseph. I can't even really say exactly why, but I just liked this painting.

The icing on the cake of Florence was our final dinner. We decided to just wander down some of the smaller alleyways to find a more off the beaten path sort of restaurant. Our efforts were rewarded. We found a great little restaurant that seemed to fit the bill. Our waitress was just great, really warm and welcoming. The food was excellent. Sara got the riboletta, a thick soup made with beans, spinach, bread, and olive oil... a Tuscan specialty. I got a thin steak and sauteed spinach. Sara finished with flan and I had panna cotta. All in all, a really wonderful meal... another one of our top three, and a must if you are visiting Florence.

Well... that's all for now. Thanks for hanging in with me.