Viva Azzurri!

We started off our second day in Florence with a tour of the Uffizi Gallery where the largest collection of Italian Renaissance art is housed.  The Uffizi is a huge, impressive museum full of thousands of religious paintings (mostly of Madonna and child).  Our favorite room housed Botticelli paintings, including the birth of Venus and Spring.

After exploring the Uffizi for several hours, we went to a little sandwich shop called I Fratellini that our friend Monica recommended.  This was one of the coolest experiences—you walk up to the shop window, choose from a list of 20 sandwiches, order a drink and pay.  Then they make your sandwich right there in front of you and hand it to you for you to enjoy on a nearby sidewalk.  For $3 euro each, I had a delicious caprese sandwich with fresh mozzarella and delicious basil.  Kyle ate hard salami with goat cheese.  The Florentine bread is unsalted, which takes a little getting used to, but at I Fratellini it tasted wonderful!

After lunch it was time to indulge in more gelato!  This time we tried a place that came highly recommended by friends and travel guides alike—Grom.  Grom had the most delicious gelato we’ve tried yet, with fresh fruit and rich, creamy chocolate.

Then it was time for our visit to the Accademia.  The Accademia is a much smaller museum than the Uffizi, but its history is quite interesting.  The museum was a former art school where artists like Michaelengelo studied painting, sculpture and architecture.  There’s also an area of the museum devoted to the musicians who studied there with a collection of 15 and 16^th century violins, pianos and other instruments on display.  The highlight of the Accademia is the statue of David, carved out of marble by Michelangelo in the early 1500s.  David is a massive masterpiece that we couldn’t take our eyes away from.  The detail in the sculpture is absolutely incredible—from the muscles to the veins in the hands.  How Micehlangelo was able to carve that out of a giant block of marble is unbelievable.

We ended the day with dinner at a local family-owned restaurant that the hotel concierge recommended.  We feasted on fresh toretellini with red sauce, ricotta and basil and mushroom pizza.  The food was delicious and the experience was memorable.  The family (who were the chefs, bartender and waitress) were watching Firenze football—an ancient sport that they now play on occasion that is a mix of American football, rugby and boxing/wrestling.  Kyle was fascinated and plans to look up the rules and story behind it.

Italy played England in the quarter finals of the Euro Cup, so we found a local pub to watch the game.  There were Italian teenagers wrapped in Italian flags yelling and waving their hands at the television—exactly the kind of atmosphere we were looking for!  After over time, the game went to a shoot-out to decide the winner.  The tension in the pub was palpable as Italy missed its second goal and England made its first two.  Italy made its third goal and England hit the cross bar, missing it’s third.  Then by an exciting turn of events, the Italian goalie made an outstanding stop on England’s fourth shot, and suddenly Italy was shooting for the win.  The English goalie dove left and the striker shot right—Italy won the game!!!  The pub erupted and the Italian teens ran around with the flags around their necks, cheering, singing and hugging each other.  We got it all on video, which I’ll post as soon as I can get the images downloaded.