Last day in Italy

Last day in Italy!

We got up this morning to go see the piti palace and boboli gardens. The palace was built kind of to spite the Medici and have something even better than theirs, but they ended up buying it and making it theirs too. Now it's a big museum; actually, more like 7. There's a modern art museum, and a costume museum, and a royal apartment museum. Just a whole lot of stuff that was pretty cool.

We went outside to the boboli gardens, which is 125 acres of beautifulness. It was a little hotter than we anticipated, so we walked up some steep hills and then just sat and watched for a little while. It was really pretty,but it was early and the day and I had things to do, so we didn't stick around as long. It'd be nice to go back, but everything is so inconvenient distance wise.

We went into the city so we could go to academia and see David, which was pretty cool. We just flashed our special passes, and we got to cut this huge line and go through the red ropes. Very cool. There were some of Michelangelo's unfinished statues, and then you turn the corner and there david is, looking huge and pensive. Theres no denying the detail and everything else was very impressive, but honestly, I like Donatello's better. The whole point of the story is that he was an underdog, which is why the people of Florence love him, so making him this huge muscular man as opposed to a feminine boy just seems like it misses the crucial part of the story.

We tried to find the peanutbutter store again, but it was closed. I thought I would go back today, but it looks like Munich might have more than I'm anticipating, and I don't really want to stock up on it and have to carry around. Plus, it's more for comfort food and ease anyway.

On our way back to the hostel I stopped at my pastry shop to get my final eclair. The man gave me a big hug when I came in, and when I told him that it was my last day he told me I would just need to come back. I will definitely miss my Italian pastry guy.

I went outside by the river with Meghan and we read and enjoyed the sunshine for a while. It was nice to get some quiet time, but the birds kept hovering in the trees above us and it made us nervous. Plus it was starting to cloud up and get chilly, so we went home.

Next adventure was laundry time; it was a hot mess, but we figured it out. The machines were tiny, and everything was expensive. We lost some change in the process and not everything is clean, and I'm a little worried about the colors my clothes will be when they come out, but it's a learning process. At least we tried.

The final adventure of Italy was our last dinner; we wandered into the swanky part of town,and then past that into the part of town we probably shouldn't have been at night. We had a lovely dinner outside though, and even though it was expensive ish, it was worth it to say good bye. I tried tiramisu, since it seemed wrong to leave Italy without tasting it, but I hated it a lot. We wanted to feed it to tony the Italian turtle (there was a turtle beside our table, in a little garden area) but he was sleeping. I did get the best wine in Italy though, and some very good spaghetti.

Then we scurried out of the city and got into a safer area, and had our final thoughts on the country. Meghan and I have some pretty great conversations, and it makes writing journal entries for Marc and Ted a lot easier. I'll do a final blog entry on the Italian experience next change I get.

Once I got back to the hotel it was time to pack up for the 7 hour train ride to Germany and get some sleep before our next big travel day! Next time you hear from me I'll be posting with German wifi!