Italy: Saturday 3/16/24 and Sunday 3/17/24

We spent the girls' Spring Break in Italy! I'm only now getting around to posting these blogs, but better late than never!

Saturday 3/16 was departure day. We had a pretty flawless series of flights today--from Pittsburgh to Newark to Rome to Florence. No delays, no drama. I'm amazed. We got an Uber from the Florence airport to our AirBnB and were able to drop our bags off before check-in time. The apartment is great--within sight of the Duomo, with three bedrooms and bathrooms and excellent views of Florence rooftops and the Duomo.

On Sunday, 3/17, we got some coffee at a little cafe nearby called Caffe Brunelleschi, learning from the barista that ordering a "latte" in Italy is literally ordering a glass of milk ("caffe latte" is what we were looking for), then set out for lunch and found an outside table at the Bar OK, where we had our first Florence meals: 

Me - pici with wild boar sauce

Andrew - pici carbonara

Lucia - pici carbonara

Greta - gnocchi

Mom - pasta fagioli

Dad - gnocchi

The food was very good, and it was a charming outdoor area. We were given shots of meloncello after the meal--new for all of us.

Afterward, we bought some groceries and headed back to the apartment to regroup. After unpacking a little and settling in, we went back out. As is our way with early-in-the-day arrivals in Europe, we planned something big for the first day: the Galleria Dell'Accademia to see the David. It did not disappoint. It's just so enormous, and the room where it's displayed is so grand; it was a perfect first event. 

We ate dinner at the apartment--a standard first-night routine for us is to get groceries for dinner--then went out to find gelato. A first-night tourist mistake--overcharged for absolutely subpar gelato. There has to be an event like this on every trip. 

Our final event of the evening: we went up to the roof terrace of our AirBnB. We could see people walking around the very top terrace of the Duomo, and Lucia began waving wildly. One person--we suspected a young girl--began waving back to Lucia. Then both of them put their phone flashlights on and waved those around. It was a highlight of Lucia's trip.