On day 5 in Rome we walked 27,534 steps. We took a train ride to Florence north of Rome. Paige had been there recently and gone through a few museums but wanted to spend more time exploring the city. We didn't have any plan except to wander where we felt and take our time enjoying it after the past few wild nonstop days. It's a smaller, cleaner city than Rome and less chaotic and more organized and easy to walk. Florence has different architectural influences that make it interesting. You have old Roman style mixed with medieval style mixed with Renaissance style. This is where the Renaissance started, and specifically with this gold door.
We started at the Duomo, a cool huge cathedral with green and coral marble exterior. It was closed to the public that day for an event, so we didn't see the inside.
True to Florence architectural hodgepodge, we turned a corner and found a medieval castle. There's a replica of David outside of it. The real one is inside a Florence museum we didn't visit (Paige saw it last time). Other statues, real or replica I don't know, were close by. We then went inside the castle to a courtyard.
We wandered further through Florence and crossed a bridge with fantastic views.
We walked along the river, taking our time and enjoying the city.
We walked up a steep hill of switchback roads for an overlook. There are stairs to climb that might be faster, but they were closed for an event. By this point the temperature had risen and the sun was beating down on us and we were losing energy.
We were hot and exhausted after the long hot hike up the hill and back down. We rested on a bench in the shade with the wind cooling us down. There may have been some heat exhaustion.
We found acai bowls, more cold water, and sandwiches after this and rested longer in an air conditioned restaurant on the famous Ponte Vecchio bridge. When we had more energy again, we moved on. We came upon a medieval parade which felt random but someone later said it was a holiday in Florence, so maybe the parade was part of that.
We spent time in the Uffizi art gallery. Paige has been there before but wanted more time. You can't tell in the pictures, but it was crowded with people and Leah had a hard time behaving herself and not imitating the statues. Like, it was really, really hard for her with so many great statue poses surrounding her, but also so many people looking at art seriously. She barely controlled herself.
We took the train ride back to Rome, and then we asked the taxi driver to drop us off near these ruins where Julius Caesar was killed. The ruins are now a cat sanctuary, and the cats are fed daily and kept safe there. We walked around and counted at least 12 cats but I'm sure there were more hiding or sleeping that late at night.
On our long walk back, we crossed over a bridge and saw the tents still set up along the river. We watched the nightlife for a while. Romans don't sleep. Every night well past midnight they're socializing and gathering and eating with no end in sight, everywhere...in piazzas, on the streets, by the river, on bridges, in open-air restaurants.
