3/1/12 Art day

By Jess

Day two in Florence was art, art and more art. We decided to start our day at the Uffizi museum - the oldest museum in the world, which also houses one of the best art collections in the world as well. The line was obsceney long so we opted to pay the extra for a guided tour of the museum so we could skip the two hour wait. Once we'd got inside (which still took some time) it was magnificent. Room after room was filled with sculptures, paintings, frescoes and church walls, many of which were spectacular. It's here we saw our first DaVinci - The Visitation of Mary. Wow. We also saw Bottielli's Birth of Venus and other famous works by many great artists and a multitude of sculptures by Michelangelo and others. Just amazing.

After spending a good half a day at the Ufuzi we then left the museum and had lunch at a self serve eatery. Once again, very mediocre food and we were unimpressed. However, now we were off to see David. We ended up having to wait for around an hour to get into the museum, there was no skipping that line, but once inside we were once again face to face with some incredible scupltures and paintings. We wandered through a few small exhibitions of religious works, and then into an awesome (if small) exhibition of musical instruments, where some original harpsichords and pianos were on display, and every string instrument as well, including about 8 Stradavrious'. Of course, what we really came to see was David and wow, wasn't he magnificent. After seeing that likeness soooo much around Italy, not to mention the mental picture I already had, to see it in the flesh was amazing. I would point out that for a gentleman with such large hands and feet, it would appear he's lacking somewhat in the groin department, but childishness aside it was breathtaking to see him in real life. Not ony that, but the gallery where he is housed also hosts the most amazing set of other sculptures by other famous artists that are just incredible. While there aren't any as big as David, some of the figures of Eve and the Greek Gods and Goddesses are astonishing in their detail. That was a big tick off my things to see before I die list.

Following seeing David we once again found the markets and did some more shopping. Andrew finally found the Nike Airs he's been looking for for over a year, which we purchased immediately (though hijinks ensued later). Very pleased with ourselves we continued wandering around the city, found a restaraunt we liked the look of and had pizza and pasta for dinner. The pizza was really lovely because it was freshly made, but once again the pasta was very meh. We followed up our dinner with some gelati and headed back to the hotel. A brilliant day all round.