Sep 1 - duh moments

There are many.

Of course there was the one-way street which didn't really have any do not enter sign or symbol from our vantage point, (even when we looked for it afterwards) ... then there was the elevator whose door didn't open ... because you have to push the door open, it doesn't slide.

Let's see ... there must be more ... I'll have to come back to this !

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Bring one lens, never really works out well. My 28-300 (effective 42-450) is great for some things but in a crowded city the wide angle lens would have been much better. You can sometimes zoom wider with your feet but often there's no room or there are so many people that obscure your view that you're only taking pictures of other people taking pictures. The Blackberry, with its wide angle, isn't even wide enough. Also, that 28-300 FX lens is heavvvvyyyyy.

We just got back to our hotel room having visited the Duomo cathedral proper, the crypt (cripta) and the bell tower (campanile). The dome is supposed to be the largest in Europe (world ?). I took some pictures but it's hard to capture the scale. We still have to go to the baptistry (battistero) and the museum (museo). They're all part of the three-day 15E ticket that we purchased ... perhaps we can find someone to give the ticket to after we're through ? I presume that it allows you more than one entry ... hmmm.

The climb up the bell tower is multi-level, comprising some 414 steps up an increasingly narrowing spiral stone staircase. My biking comes in handy with that, never even breaking a sweat or panting like all the people around me ! In fact, the exercise felt good ... perhaps I'll go back and climb it a few more times :). I don't get any exercise shuffling around on the stone roadways at slow speed, nor am I much for walking, when it comes right down to it.

more later ...

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Well, we did the battistero and the museo, which didn't take as much time as we expected, so we headed to another museum which featured Michaelangelo's David but no photos allowed, not even without flash. I saw a few surreptitious photos being taken but having been warned once, I didn't break the rules. In between the battistero and the museo we had lunch at a little cafeteria which had enticing-looking light food but didn't turn out that well (compared to how well we've been eating !). We'll survive until dinner though, now back in the room and beating the heat.

In addition to our pre-paid room there is a city tax that you pay in cash. That isn't so bad -- 3E per day each so 12E total. The parking is another matter -- from 7am to 2pm, 2E for the first hour; 3E for the second hour; 8E for each subsequent hour and then 2E or 3E from 2pm to 7am (I forget). Anyway, through the hotel we pay 20E per day ... otherwise the parking would cost more than the hotel bill ! It seems that they really want to keep cars out of the historic district. Residents are another matter -- residents of the historic district of course. Non residents of the historic district walk in, as our lobby desk lady told us.

Breakfast wasn't exciting. Coffee wasn't so great; food was limited. Of course we both brought some cereal but the coffee was a disappointment. We went downstairs and had a good espresso/cappuccino at the cafe one door down.

We are museum'd out for now. Tomorrow we head for Bolsena, south of here. It's hot as hell here in Florence, when you're in the sun and likely hotter further south.

We have somewhat of a plan. From here to Bolsena and then to Corvara. We plan to stay in that area for a few nights, TBD, then to Venice, then to Zurich, then to outskirts of Paris then to CDG. We looked at the rates for Venice -- multiple hundreds of Euros per night, but hotels on the "mainland" cost much less and have shuttles. We'll do that, thank you very much. Sandy wants to see Venice and I don't mind doing so. I saw it in 1975 ... seems like yesterday (NOT).

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Plans are making more progress. We studied the maps and routes and decided that it was going to be too long a drive from Bolsena to Corvara all in one shot. We picked another town on the route and made a booking and then after booking the confirmation said that we had to pay an extra 20E if we were only staying one or two nights. Annoyed more than anything else, because the booking agent's system is supposed to show the total price, I called to cancel and probably spent the 20E in phone charges but seemed to have cancelled. The agent called the hotel while I was on hold, couldn't get someone who spoke English, called me back just over an hour later. After that was dealt with, we made another reservation in Radda in Chianti, about half-way between Bolsena and Corvara. That gives us about 250kms per day to drive which should be manageable .... after all, I rode further than that on my bike ... of course I rode for more hours than I want to drive !

Venice and Zurich look do-able and we decided to actually book something in Bolsena, rather than take a chance on something being available. It's in the historic district vs along the waterfront, but it's a small town. Our drive today should be relatively short, 2-3 hours, depending on how much driving we do on the Autostrade (I had mistakenly spelled it Autostrada in an earlier blog).

This is the longest vacation that we've ever taken at just under 4 weeks. Our typical vacations were one week / ten days, with a couple being two weeks -- Florida once or twice. We also took some weekend trips, 5 day jaunts, squeezing in some time, doing Paris, London and Rome some years ago. There were also a few times we added days to a trip west where we got in some skiing. Over a working career these business trip extensions were few, perhaps six in total, but memorable.

Sandy's still asleep, but then it's only 5:10 a.m. I couldn't sleep and have been up since 4am. I'm kind of trapped at the moment, since I cannot leave the room without removing the mag card from the slot that turns on the power to the room, otherwise I'd go to the lobby and read. I suppose that I could sit in the bathroom ... there is a seat ...

Onward !