We started out the christmas break with a free trip to a modern art exhibit going on in the center of Lille. This art exhibit was a part of the Phantastique festival that has been going on since October and will end sometime in January. I'm a lover of art and I like to think I'm a fairly open minded person, but this exhibit was down right bizarre. There are somethings in like you just can't un-see. I don't entirely understand the motivation for this art exhibit and there are really no good words to describe so I will just post a series of photos and let you take it all in for yourself.
Now, onto CHRISTMAS! When we woke up Christmas morning Santa had figured out that Chad and I were not spending the occasions at our homes in Indiana and instead delivered all of our presents to Lille, France. Just kidding we just bought each other gifts. We spent the morning opening presents and cooking a Christmas brunch that we shared with Deliece and her two friends from Trinidad. We had homemade crepes, a potato, egg, peppers and cheese creation a la Chad and spicy Trinidad fried mushrooms. A food coma soon ensued. We of course couldn't complete the day without a giant Christmas feast. Thanks to our new Trinidadian friends we didn't have to go without. They cooked a giant meal to share with us consisting of entirely traditional Trinidadian dishes (loaded with spices and seasonings). It was AMAZING! Chad and I have already decided that our next big trip will be to Trinidad and Tobago. We ended the evening watching Home Alone 2, packed up our bags and headed into Lille center. Chad and I would be leaving for Florence, Italy very early the next morning and since the metro system doesn't seem to be overly reliable in Lille we decided to rent a hotel room right across from the train station in town for the night. We woke up at 4:30am the morning after Christmas to catch a train into Paris Charles de Gaulle airport where we then caught a 9:00am flight to Florence, Italy with a layover in Frankfurt, Germany.
We didn't have any problems while traveling to Florence and once we arrived we quickly found our hotel and dropped off our bags before heading into the city for some sight seeing. Our hotel was in a great location, but then again most everything in Florence is no more than a couple blocks away from each other since it's such a small city with so much packed into a tiny area. At first glance our hotel room seemed quaint and ideally Italian, but after one night in that room we soon realized that there was little to no hot water for the shower, the beds were made entirely of springs in uncomfortable to sleep on and there were little cockroaches crawling out of the door frames in the bathroom. We tried to chalk this up to being a part of the experience and not letting it affect our trip, but none the less it was very disturbing. Let's just say that hotel did not get a very good online review from us.
Our first afternoon in Florence was spent eating real Italian pizza, checking out il Duomo from the outside and then taking the free walk through of the inside, exploring the Piazza della Republica, stopping to listen to live musician play in the streets, crossing the Ponte Vecchio, stumbling upon the Piazza della Vecchio and ending a rather long and tiring day with some much needed gelato.
Day 2 in Florence started off with some souvenir shopping in the San Lorenzo market. It was mostly leather goods: purses, belts, shoes and books. We moved onto the church of Santa Maria Novella, but before that we had to stop for authentic cannoli. Next we went back to the Piazza del Vecchio to see all the statues in the day light. We revisited the Ponte Vecchio to take in all of its gaudiness and decadence. If you are on the market from some expensive jewelry this is the place to come to. We saw the Pitti Palace from the outside, but decided against going inside. We stopped for lunch at what would become our favorite sandwich cafe in all of Florence. You could make your own sandwich including 5 different toppings (meats, cheeses, sauces and vegetables) for only 4.50 euro. We crossed the river that runs through Florence by way of a different bridge and stopped for yet another serving of gelato. We quickly scanned through the southern part of the city to see a couple more churches (Santa Croce and Sanata Spirito). It was beginning to get dark and we were getting hungry so we stopped for dinner at a small restaurant just off the Duomo for some authentic cheese, pasta and wine.
Our second full day in Italy was spent in Pisa. Yes, if we were so close we figured we may as be the tourist that we are and see The Leaning Tower. We took a train from the main station out of Florence through the Tuscan countryside and into Pisa. Pisa isn't a very big city and since there is pretty much just The Leaning Tower it's not as big of a tourist trap as Florence. We made the trek through the city and over the Ponte Solferino to the Duomo plaza. We decided against climbing the tower (maybe out of fear that it would topple over and we couldn't justify the 15 euro it would cost to climb to the top). Instead we took a bus out to the marina and spent some time walking along the coast and enjoying the waves lapping up to the rock beach. We had lunch at a small cafe and indulged in some more Italian pizza. We took a late train back into Florence and rested up for our final day in Italy.
The majority of our last day in Florence was spent souvenir shopping, filling ourselves with as much pizza pasta and gelato our bellies could handle and waiting in line to see The Statue of David. We waited around an hour to see the giant statue of Michaelangelo's David. I of course got in trouble for taking a photo, but then didn't delete it off my camera. There wasn't much else to see in the Academia art museum besides David. We ended out day on the Michaelangelo plaza at sunset. We had bought a bottle of wine and some chocolate to enjoy while watching the sunset over the mountains and city of Florence. We spent at least an hour or two at the Plaza taking in the breathtaking city scape of Florence but once the sun had set it quickly got cold so we headed back towards our hotel for one final amazing dinner.
I think I'll resume my Christmas break blog at a later date, otherwise this will turn into a novel. Hope you enjoyed reading about my Christmas celebration and traveling around Florence, Italy. I'll catch you up on the rest of my travels shortly!
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