Amsterdam & Italy 2011: Day 6 - Florence MTV TRL Awards 20Apr2011

A day that included catching a train from Venice to Firenze, getting an overview of the Duomo & Uffizi, more gelato tasting, great local pizza and watching some of the MTV TRL Awards live in Piazza San Croce. Technical challenges were also faced as I finally began to merge all the photos and videos that Dena, Daniel and I are taking and realizing they were not always in the same time zone…well, you can well imagine how obsessed I might get with trying to fix the metatags for the files.

We wished Venice a fond ciao and moved on by train to the next stop on our adventure, Firenze. At the ticket counter, we were greated by a shake of the head and the question - today? Oh great. Eventually we were able to get seats for the 1327 hrs train after first offering us tickets for 1627 hrs. We hung around the station and I bought a cappucino at the station for just 1 Euro. It turns out though that what I had learned in the past no longer worked - “una cappo” should really be “una cappuci.” The price was still right! Why do the very clean looking waiting rooms at the train stations smell like urine? We preferred to hang out with the fresh air, trackside.

After putting our feet up at the Hotel Casci, and having more cappucinos here, we went out for a little stroll for about four hours just to get us familiarized for the next couple of days we have here. We passed through the nearby market for our first taste and smell of leather. Yes, I tried on a buffalo leather jacket, that the shop owner claimed was durable and fireproof - just what I’m looking for in leather. Oh yes, he also claimed buffalo make the best mozarella! Hey, wait a second, I don’t even look good in leather! I was able to walk away thanks to Laura providing the thumbs down. We later found out that the leather is sourced in South America, finished in China and mass produced in factories here in Italy. Maybe. The food highlights of the outing were the best gelato yet at Gelatoria Perche No! After taking in the sunset at Ponte Vecchio, we found a great local wood burning oven pizzeria, La Mangiatoia, where all pizzas were between 4.50 - 6.50 Euros which we ate back on the Ponte Vecchio.

We finished off the evening watching the beginning of the MTV TRL awards in Piazza San Croce and are now catching the rest of the live show back in our hotel room on TV. Tomorrow is another big day….