Sunday, October 21, 2007

Florence


From this balcony, just off the breakfast room of our hotel in Florence, we could look down the street to the famous Ponte Vechio.


Here is Ponte Vechio from the other side of the river.


Florence is famous as the home of many of the great works of Michelangelo. The "David" is one of them. This replica stands in the Plaza di Senioria; the original is housed in the Academia, a few blocks away.


This is the famous "Gates to Paradise", a masterwork of Lorenzo Ghiberti that adorns the entrance to the Baptistery San Giovanni. The ten panels of the gates depict characters and scenes from the Old Testament: Adam and Eve; Cain and Abel; Noah; Abraham; Isaac with Esau and Jacob; Joseph; Moses; Joshua; David; and Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.


Here is a very large image of the front of the Duomo in Florence. Click the image for a larger view.


Tradition has it that if you drop a coin from this Boar's mouth, while rubbing his nose, and if falls through the grate then you will have good luck for the rest of the day. It looks like Audrey just missed it!


The marketplace in Florence is really something! We bought a lot of leather goods (jackets, purses, etc.), since that is apparently what you are supposed to do in Florence. Audrey was also intrigued by the many stalls selling everything from vegetables to pasta to, in this case, fresh seafood and fish.


Florence is a lovely city, with extrodinary statues almost everywhere you look!


When in Florence, every scientifically educated person should pay a visit to the Basilica di Santa Croce...


... and stop at the tomb of the great astronomer and physist Galileo. Other notables who are buried in Santa Croce include: Fermi, Marconi, Dante, and Machiavelli, among others.


We also paid a visit to the Natural History Museum of the University of Firenze. We went specifically to view the amazing true-to-life wax models of human disections created for teaching medicine in the 1700's - which are absolutely astonishing. Along the way, we stopped at this exhibit of Primates...


As we strolled the city after dark, we came across several artists creating these wonderful chalk drawings on the sidewalk. Clearly, the arts are alive and well in Florence!

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