Firenze

The Hostel we stayed in was great it was like nice hotel with a pool, sauna, rooftop terrace, bar downstairs, it definitely set a very high standard for my first time in a hostel.

Approaching Il Duomo.

Just wow! The Duomo is absolutely amazing the colored stone and the massive scale just erupts out of the winding narrow streets of Florence.

The competition doors of Brunelleschi and Ghiberti.

Stairs at the Hostel to the roof.

From the top of the hostel the view was amazing and I was one of two other people in our group to make it up there.

The street lights are really cool with anthropomorphic support legs.

Ponte Vecchio.

Santa Croce inside the tombs of Dante, Michelangelo, Machiavelli, Galleleio and many more lay.

The piazza surrounding Santa Croce.

The Arno near sunset.

Chimney smoke and vespa blur.

Across the street from the Uffizi Museum.  The Uffizi houses numerous famous paintings.  My favorites there were Venus:Botticelli, Adoration of the Magi(unfinished):Da Vinci, Medusa: Carvaggio, and Decapitation of Holofernese: Gentileschi 

This guy just owned the place.

Beat at this point. Working on 8 hours of sleep in the whole weekend, this is sunday at 5 and I was dirty greasy tired exhausted worn out feet but so happy.  Florence was a great time.  We were able to meet Sean Sullivan there who showed us a great time.  The previous night Sean's tour company put on a pub crawl and we showed up and there was a crowd of over a hundred other american students there and the deal was 11 euro and the first bar was 2 hours all you could drink heineken on tap or sex on the beach.  Obviously I drank my fair share (heineken of course) and worth within the first half hour.  After that we went to two or three more bars and got free shots there.  However the rest of the night remains somewhat cloudy in my memory.  From what I recall got lost walking around for about an hour than found duomo and sat in amazement for an hour at like 4 in the morning.  It was a great time and I will definitely have to return.

Italian Renaissance Gardens: Villa Lante

I'm taking this Italian Gardens class this semester and we will be checking out around 5 or 6 Renaissance gardens around this region.  This garden is Villa Lante and is located in Bagnaia the same small town that the bonfire was in.  We went two fridays ago but I was unable to post until now due to being sick with a cold and flu all last week.  But this garden was absolutely amazing.  However, on that day it was hardly pleasing, it had snow flurried most of the morning and I had to get up earlier than most of the other students because I am volunteering on Friday mornings in the local high school.  The english class is all girls and they were very excited to meet us and ask us lots of questions about america and about our lives in america.  There were lots of questions about pop culture which I was unable to answer but not so disappointed about that.  But I was surprised that there were a few of them that were able to speak and understand our english very well and there were a few of them that I could tell just didnt know it or just didnt care.  After that we had lecture about this garden as it was snowing outside then turned to rain and we were in question about going out there.  But at the end of the lecture the rain had stopped and we decided to go and I was miserable.  I hadnt eaten anything except an espresso on the go and I was terribly unprepared for the cold damp weather outside.  So miserably I went along and we waited for the bus to come and when it did we all got on and the driver got off.  He smoked a cigarette and then told us we were too many and that he wouldnt take us we would have to take another bus out there. So Ok we waited for another bus out there and got of at the little town so cold and raw out and walked up to the garden. Upon arrival and first step into the garden my spirits had turned, I realized it was totally worth it...

The Pegasus fountain, Pegasus in ancient literature was responsible for kicking the ground in the mountains that provided water to support the people.  So due to this most of the gardens have a Pegasus fountain.

This is the seal of Cardinal Gambera.  Gambera meaning prawn or crayfish is the one who built this garden.  As a Cardinal he had a great deal of wealth and built this garden for himself while he resided and was a ruler here in Viterbo.

This is called a water chain and it runs from one level of the garden to the next and at the head of the fountain here the water comes out of a crayfish showing that Gambera has provided the garden with a source of water. Also a showing of his power.

Also in every garden we will see there is always a fountain dedicated to the local river gods as we see here.

This was a lunch table with a flow of water through the middle which was used back in the day to keep jugs of wine cool.

The bottom of the garden and the grand finale per se.