Italy trip part 10 イタリア旅行 パート１０

June 30th. (Mon.) Florence 3rd day.

6:45 am wake up, breakfast at hotel
8:30 am ready to climb up to Duomo steps. 6 euro/person
10:00 am Central Market and San Lorenzo Market: Shopping and lunch
1:30 am-3:00 pm nap time
3:30 pm Richard Ginori Outlet
6:30 pm Piazza Michelangelo
Dinner at Trattoria Sabatino

６月３０日（月）　フィレンチェ３日目

今日は朝早くに起きてドゥオモに登ります。４６３の階段を登るのですが、すっごい狭い階段で途中休憩したくともする場所がない。（後ろから人がやってくるので…）とにかく一気に上がるしかないんです。小さな窓から見えるフィレンチェの景色を時折みながらひたすら階段を登ります。この狭い階段の壁のいたる所に落書きがしてありました。日本語もちらほら見かけました。ちょっと悲しくなったよ。こんなに素晴らしい建物にまでサインしていかないといけないの？

とにかく上にまで登りました。絶景！やっぱり登って良かったです。朝一で行かないと混んでる確率が高いそうなので、朝から登る事をオススメします♪
その後はサンロレンゾ広場の市場や中央市場などで買い物をしました。
美味しそうな食材がたくさん！ポルチーニも乾燥トマトも真空パックにしてくれるので色々買いました。

その後…。念願のジノリのアウトレットに行く事に。どうやら夏の営業時間では今日は開いているとのこと。もう一回行ったから行き方はばっちりです！だいぶお安くなっております。ジョンはこんなものに興味ないんですが、私が好きなので付き合ってくれています。ジョンにティーポットとか色々買ってもらいました。あぁ優しい旦那様です。大満足で帰ってきました。（あんまり喜んでいる私を見てジョンもまた喜んでくれてました。２日前の落ち込みようが今はこんなんですからね…。単純な妻だなと思っている事でしょう）その後ミケランジェロ広場でフィレンチェを一望。私は以前父と一緒にここで写真を撮ったので、色々思い出していました。

さて、私だけるんるん気分では申し訳ないので、今夜は２日前に行けなかったレストランへもう一度行ってみます。ジョンが行きたがっているレストランですよー。私も頑張って歩きます。今日は開いてました〜〜〜！　ジョンの笑顔も最高です。ここの食べ物は美味しかったです。

今日もとてもいい一日でした♪

Got up early to climb up to the beautiful Duomo today! According to the book, aka Rick Steve's book, we do want to go early so that we don't have to wait in line for a long time. We were ready! well, that's what we thought. I asked John if I needed to wear long shirt and pants to cover skin since we were going to a church. (most of the places in Italy, you can't wear spaghetti strap shirt or shorts when you get in churches.) He told me that we were just going to climb up the stairs so I don't need to... Then when we were in front of the gate, there was a big sign of their dress code. RIGHT. So we went back to our hotel to change our clothes, then came back to the Duomo. Luckly, Florence is not a big city so we did not have to walk that much for doing that.
A small entrance...

narrow steps...

So, it is going to be a long (463 steps!) narrow steps, but we knew it was going to be worth it. And it sure was awesome. The sad part was though...along the steps, there were so many graffiti that tourists left. Just their names and random stuff...John and I were so sad to see that. I mean...have a little respect, you know?
View from the top...(and can you tell I am tired???)


Inside the Chapel

yay! we made it!

After that, we went to San Lorenzo Market and Central Market right by our hotel. Many restaurants buy food from Central Market, so they had all kinds of food for sure. We saw pig's head, guts and pig head skin ...you name it. We got lots of spices, olive oil, and dried mushrooms here and surely I was happy. :-) We ate some food at the market (Nerbonf) and it was quite fun.


So, you remember that 3 stores closed on us 2 days ago? Well, now we know about their summer hours, we called them again. And now we know that Richard Ginori Outlet is open today! Praise the Lord! I could not take it! I was so happy. :) Now we know how to get there, it was a piece of cake.
We get there and I was looking everywhere. They make beautiful stuff... We thought about getting our china set and ship them to the States, but shipping was about $450, so we decided not to. But John got me a tea pot, 6 tea cups and a plate. They were 50-70 % off and I was so happy!
I am smiling...

Then we dropped our stuff off at our hotel, then went back to the station to catch a bus to Piazza Michelangelo. There will be another replica of David's statue and you can look down the whole city of Florence. I have a picture of me and my Dad last time we were in Florence. Such a special place for me. :)
You can see the old bridge and Duomo in the back

city of Florence...


December, 2000 with my Dad. :)

and more statue of David...

After that, our mission was not over, yet. Again, you remember that John wanted to go to this restaurant 2 days ago and it was closed? Yes, it was supposed to be open today so we have to try it.
We took a bus from Piazza Michelangelo and walked a little bit and found the restaurant!
John was super happy! Can you tell???

As we entered the restaurant, this couple started to saying hi to John. I was like...??? then I quickly realized that this must be the couple he met last night while he was doing the laundry! Yes, my guess was right. Apparently, John told them about this place and gave them a map and address, so they came! They just ordered their drinks, so we decided to eat together. We all wanted to try different stuff, so we just ordered many dishes and shared the meal... you know family style!
It was so much fun. One awkward moment... I asked them when they got married...then they were like, oh we aren't married. We bought a house together in Canada but we are not married yet. Then nobody said anything... so that was awkward a bit. But they acted like they were a married couple!
They both work for Canadian military and we got along really well. It was nice to have a meal with another couple. Oh, and I just remembered that they kept calling John as Tom. At first I was like who are they talking about? Was Tom at the laundry place too? Then I realized that they think John's name was Tom. So they kept calling him Tom and I kept calling John. :)
Really good prosciutto


This was John's favorite. Stuffed chicken.

Doesn't look so good but everyone at the restaurant was ordering...so we had to order. It was pretty good.

We were going to see this free concert after the dinner but we must lost track of time...(again, they wanted to drink beer just like last night) then we wanted to take some pictures on the bridge.
So as we got the outside stage, the concert has just ended. John was super bummed about that.

The Old Bridge at night...

With Tara and Jason


So, this was our last day in Florence...and we got to accomplish all the things we wanted to do while we were here. Bad start but great ending with new friends!
We had a wonderful day today.