Oh the beauty of Florence!

So we made all our recordings and went over them with Dario and just like that we were off to Florence! The drive there was very enjoyable with lots of nice scenic views. Upon getting to Florence we started doing some work (yes…work!) and then headed off to the city center for dinner. Florence is so nice! It’s got so many nice buildings but at the same time provides one with a small town atmosphere. Since it was getting kind of dark I didn’t take too many pictures but the ones I did take were very nice (I think at least!). After walking around Florence for a little while I decided to take the shuttle back to the hotel and get ready to go out to see what a night in Florence was like! Peter eventually decided to come with me as well. I decided to be ‘adventurous’ and drive to the city center which was only 10 km from the hotel, since it was later in the night and the hotel shuttle times had ended. To spice things up even more we didn’t turn on the GPS. Two minutes later I ended up (somehow!) on the highway headed back for Rome hahahaha. But we went in a few circles here and there and somehow found our way into Florence’s center eventaully. We then parked at a parking lot near the main train station. Figuring out how to pay for parking here was a story in itself and let’s just leave it at that. I’ve gotta say though it is sooooooo easy to make a wrong turn and end up on the highway in Italy, this is like the millionth time it’s happened to me and I’ve only been to two cities so far. Anyways, getting back to the day – we were walking around in Florence and went to a café/bar called Gilli near Piazza della Repubblica. There was a live band playing songs on request and I had an awesome dessert there. Overall the night was pretty good. We weren’t really dressed to actually go out to a night club so after sitting and listening to the band for while (and enjoying my dessert of course!) I decided to head back….especially since I didn’t bring my jacket and I was getting quite cold AND it was also slowly beginning to rain. That was pretty much the day. The hotel we’re at is very nice and interestingly enough has an ABNORMAL amount of tourists here from Japan. In fact I’ve been very surprised at the number of oriental tourists in Rome and Florence so far…I never expected so many in big groups hahahaha. But yeah the hotel is nice and we’re probably going to pay and go on a walking tour across the city tomorrow. Driving back we went in a bunch of circles and eventually ended up using the GPS…