Florence— Here We Are

Wednesday morning I made my way to the market to purchase the food I needed to make dinner for us and the Kent State girls. I planned to make salami and cheese, a Caprese salad (copied from last night), spaghetti carbonara, steak, and broccoli.

Jen and I spent the morning exploring the Uffizi museum and walked across the Ponte Vecchio with a zillion other tourists (I just can’t imagine what the summer months are like):

Jen met the girls to climb up the Duomo and I headed back to our apartment to cook dinner. It was fun to be back in the kitchen and I tried to make everything look beautiful the “Italy” way.  We had a washing machine that took 1 1/4 hours–no dryer but clothes dry fast on a rack in Florence.  It is nice to have clean clothes.

The next morning we took the 1-hour 7-minute train to Pisa (all the people in Florence followed us here):

I got so tired of lugging my suitcase that I went to the .99 euro store and bought a box and tape. I crammed as many things as I could in the box and took it to the Mail Box store to “FedEx” it home for 77€ (about $91).  So nice to have a lighter suitcase.

In the afternoon we went to see the beautiful David:

After that we met the girls for dinner at a neat restaurant:

Of course, we had to have a cannoli at their favorite supplier:

We are off to Rome on the fast train in the morning.  I have ingredients for capicola, cheese, and basil sandwiches.