I and my wife have decided to take a road trip type of vacation last summer of 2019. We have chosen to ride across a region of Tuscany in Italy. Everybody knows that it is quite a diverse region, where you can have many stops each of them having its own beauty. One of the locations we have visited was the historical town - Florence.
Due to limited time over the entire holiday we’ve been left only with one day for Florence, which is extremely short for such a town with an extremely rich program available. If you want to explore this place, take a week at least. Therefore, I as a local guide must have used all my skills and instincts to evaluate the upcoming trip the best I could to achieve the most satisfying experience as possible.
As we entered the city from South driving down the hill I could already overview the downtown from above and was sorry we did not reserve more time for this place. Using the google maps a few days before I have booked an apartment not too close not too far from downtown in order to get an affordable price and explore more than just a central city (even if only moving between places). The Bandinelly Apartment was part of old and typical Italian urban architecture from more than 100 years ago, the owners were super friendly and provided excellent service. This is the balcony to the street, I felt simply authentic over there.
We took a walk by the river and based on snappy reviews from google maps hit on a bar called Santarosa Bistrot that was located still outside of downtown. It was rather an outdoor place with old school furniture a great selection of wine. The great thing about it - nobody was a tourist. We were the only ones between the locals sipping wine and eating cheese, which felt just right.
While walking towards the historical center of Florence by a river of Arno we have observed an unusual bridge - Ponte Vecchio. There were very old houses built on the bridge whose reason why it was built like this is perhaps amusing - google it, cause it would be too many words for this article.
Florence was the town where Leonardo Da Vinci lived and operated through most of his phenomena and thus, we have looked at an interesting place to visit during our short wine break in Santarosa. The interactive museum was called Da Vinci Experience and provided extensive information about Da Vinci’s life, work, lifestyle, etc… You could find a tangible demonstration of his inventions while being able to try how it functioned. The other cool part was a video projection demonstrated in a big room explaining all you need to know about Leonardo via all his professions he was known for.
The next stop was a delightful square with numerous sculptures all around. Here you could really feel the history - it was screaming from the walls. One part of this place was a sort of passage with marble sculptures that were illustrating Roman time. This spot was called Loggia dei Lanzi and I rate it as my number one square I have ever seen.
Now it was time to have a drink. Right behind a corner, we found a busy bar upselling a typical apparel drink, I had a beer. ? Although the prices were skyrocketing, it was worth to sit there for a while, because having a glass of beer with this view was just incredible. Palazzo Vecchio was right in front of me. I have even remembered how I was climbing this tower in Assasin’s Creed game many years ago.
Then we took a walk across the city to see Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore. While walking across downtown we hit on the Bialetti shop, where they had 80% sale on all pink and orange pans. That was a deal - I got one for EUR 20, which normally costs 100.
The cathedral was beautiful, even though it was closed, a slow walk around the building was lovely. The street musician and other artists were increasing the level of experience to much higher levels.
After seeing these few but pleasing sites, we were ready to take a zigzagy walk to our apartment where a typical Italian dinner was waiting for us.