I am including a few photos from last night when Randy and I went on a walk. We walked on a street full of jewelry stores on a bridge over the River Arno, called Ponte Vecchio. That means old bridge, but it is also called Florence’s Bridge of Gold. So much gold, silver, and gems! Bling, bling, bling.
There are other stores, too, including one that had some gloves I had seen and thought I would like to buy. I thought some nice leather gloves would be a good souvenir, and also, my hands have been cold. :)
Click on pictures to see full photo, title, and description. For the 100s of photos we took, see my smugmug: https://moonfamily.smugmug.com/Travel/Italy-2026
Today we went on a food tour (Secret Food Tour Company again). There was a couple from Alberta on the tour with us. They were very nice and friendly. It made the tour even more fun. For much of the tour it was raining rather hard. We’ve had quite a bit of rain off and on, but we got wetter today than any other day. Cori has an umbrella, but I have my rain hat and Randy pulled his rain jacket hood over his baseball cap. The guide worried about us not having an umbrella. At one point, he stopped in front of a store and said, “You can buy an umbrella here.” We said we were fine (and we were). The wife of the couple said, “They’re from the Pacific Northwest; they know how to dress for the rain.”
We met our guide, Paolo, at the base of the statue of Dante in front of Basilica di Santa Croce, a church where Michelangelo, Galileo, and Machiavelli, among others, are buried. All our food stops were delicious and interesting. Paolo grew up here, and his father worked in a leather factory.
We stopped for biscuits and caffe at a bakery; toured a leather factory and school that was previously a Dominican church and friary; and had some fruit at the largest open market in Florence. We went to a street food cart that served Lampredotto, “a classic and iconic street food from Florence, Italy, made from the abomasum—the fourth and final stomach of a cow,” according to Wikipedia. It was surprisingly delicious, served with salsa verde. The cart was quite busy because it had been featured on Stanley Tucci’s special, “Tucci in Italy.”
And, of course, gelato. I had an affogato (or, according to Wikipedia, “affogato al caffè (literally 'drowned in coffee’), an Italian dessert comprising a scoop of gelato, either fiordilatte (plain milk-flavored) or vanilla, topped with espresso. It was delicious! I had seen them before but never tasted. A friend on Facebook reminded me to have one. I think I’ll try making it at home with espresso and Edaleen ice cream. I bet it will be great. It’s kind of like a root beer float, but with coffee. (I forgot to take a picture.)
Last night I had a pretty terrible time, very little sleep. Our apartment is super nice, but there were a bunch of mosquitoes in it. As you may know, mosquitoes love me. I have bites all over. On my arm, there are two bites just an inch apart, bites on my fingers, all over, just awful. I killed one early on and thought, “Oh, good,” thinking I was safe now. No! Every time I started to doze, “Nnnnnhnnnhnnn,” in my ear. I would slap myself, or clap like mad by my ear. But I don’t think I got any more. Randy slept right through it all, although he has a bunch of bites, too. And mosquitoes love Cori as much as they love me.
I was totally hot and bothered. I kept hearing that buzzing so much I started to wonder if I was imagining it. I ended up lying there thinking of better names for this horrible insect. Mosquito seems like too pretty of a word for them. I kept thinking Gollum would be good — I’m reading Lord of the Rings. Maybe Biter. Stinker. Itching-torture bug. Any ideas?
This morning as Randy finished dressing he said, “I just killed 4 mosquitoes.” We closed all the windows and have been killing more. I bet there have been at least a dozen or more. Yuck! It gets warm with the windows closed and I couldn’t figure out how to turn on the wall unit air conditioners. I’d point the remote at them and nothing would happen. I sent a note to the landlord and he told me I needed to put a little key in a switch in the wall. Now we are super cool. Hoping we’ve killed all the biter/stinker/itching-torture bugs, and I will sleep well tonight.