Saturday Evening

We finished up our Saturday morning by heading to the Duomo to have a little indoor tour. (Led by me, of course!)



Since it was Immaculate Conception day, there were lots of masses happening. We caught a good part of one.



We popped over to La Rinascente to finish up our tour from the night before.



We walked up to the castle to do a quick bit of catch up shopping at the street fair, and then headed back toward my apartment. We shopped at Penny, me for groceries, my sister for souvenir food to take home. It wasn't too crowded, luckily. We huddled up in the apartment, packing Vio's bag and having a few snacks, before heading to my landlord's for aperitivo and pasta dinner. It was a lot of fun, and a great, relaxing way to spend an evening.

Saturday Morning Church Tour

Saturday morning we got up early to go see Cenacolo, the Leonardo Da Vinci Last Supper, at Santa Maria delle Grazie. It was a pretty cool experience, it is truly a masterpiece. Our group of 25 included a Japanese tour group, who were a bit of a block, but they were also guided around to see some other things in the refectory so we got some unobstructed time. After the Last Supper, we toured the inside of the church, which had some beautiful carved icons.



We walked past the fair, which was still on.



We were on our way over to the Santo Stefano Maggiore area and we passed by a 1928 tram next to a new one. The future and the past!



We were on our way first to San Bernardino alle Ossa, Vio's selection for weird churches. The church is famous for its ossuary. It's a little creepy, no? Still, a unique sight.



The ceiling fresco was actually really awesome, with cool layered corners. The bone decorations are fascinating.



After we popped into Santo Stefano.



We headed back to the Duomo area for Panzerotti at Luini's and gelato at Cioccolati Italiani...

Friday in Milano

Friday we took the train out of Venice, after a crazy hunt for a mask that Vio fancied. The good news was that our plot to obtain it went flawlessly, and we made it out of there with no problems.



We regathered our strength at my apartment for a few hours, then braved the incredible cold and snow to head to the holiday festivities. We went to Basilica Sant'Ambrogio to see the saint himself, and we ended up sticking around for mass. It was one of the pretty ones with a choir, and wasn't too long since they really pack them in on the holidays!



After we headed to Fiera degli Oh Bej Oh Bej and did some shopping. I bought some cool stuff, and Vio bought a few things too. We didn't end up snacking out there since it was so cold out there, we headed over to la Rinascente instead so we could sit inside and have cocktails and cheese. Lots of cheese.



Look at how much snow is falling! I know that it's not a lot by New England standards, but seriously for Milan that it pretty snowy for early December.



We made it home and even to bed at a decent hour. Thank goodness it's toasty in my apartment, my toes were chilly after that evening!

Thursday Evening

After the museum, we went to lunch at Ae Oche, a pretty cheap and decent pizzeria.



We went to Scuola di San Rocco after lunch, one of my favorite weird sights in Venezia. The whole thing is decked out in Tintoretto paintings. The ground level is pretty sober looking, but up on the first floor it's pretty bonkers, with really weird allegorical carvings by Pianta. After we took the boat out to see the inside of Santa Maria della Salute.



We decided to take a boat around the "bottom" of Venice, between the main part of the city and Giudecca, just to see a little new territory. Man, it got dark quite quickly on our boat trip! By the time we were at the west end of Giudecca it was pretty much completely night-time. We were on the 2 vaporetto, and we rode all the way around to Rialto just so we could walk over and see the bridge.



We had dinner at a little place not so far from our hotel. I am not sure I ever saw the sign for the place. We were pretty close to the only customers, it was a cold slow night.



We had pasta dishes and grilled veggies, and some red wine of course. The guy who was running the place gave us a little dessert and aperitif liqueur so we were there for quite a while relaxing and enjoying.



It was a good night!

The Second Part of Wednesday

After the Basilica, we headed back to our hotel on the Vaporetto to warm up for a bit before dinner. A kind gentleman took our photo while we were leaving from St. Mark's.



I have a bunch of photos of Santa Maria della Salute in the sunset from different angles.





We passed the DHL boat making its rounds.



For dinner we just started wandering south of our hotel and went the first place that had an appealing menu. Since the tourists were so thin on the ground, the proprietors were out in force dragging in us strays. Vio had gnocchi, I had eggplant parmesan. For dessert we made it down to the Grom by Frari. I had Zabaione... Vio had... I don't know but she's clearly into it!



I took a bacio hot chocolate for the road home!

Wednesday In Venezia Part 1

Well, I put Vio on the plane back to Boston today... I'm all alone in Italy! Sad. At least it was a nice vacation for us. I still have a lot to share from our vacation, so expect bits of it for the rest of the week.

Wednesday was our first whole day in Venezia. We got up and had our breakfast at the hotel, complete with coffee drinks. We headed into Saint Mark's on the vaporetto. Vio was a little doubtful about the boats at first, but she ended up going for it.



We did the Secret Itineraries tour at the Doge Palace that morning. It was great the last time, and was great this time. It deserves its spot on my Venice "must do" list for guests. We puttered about the palace after the tour, the place was pretty deserted. I liked this Doge's head in the sculptural elements section.



We grabbed a quick pizza lunch just off the square, then headed to Saint Mark's Basilica next. We got the Pala D'Oro to ourselves for a few minutes. (That is a true sign of how deserted it was.) It was the best.



Vio talked me into seeing the treasury. She likes reliquaries too much.



There were some pretty cool normal treasures in there too. They have a free audio guide to the treasury, but it's a little off, there are several things in the guide that aren't in there anymore. The treasury was cool to see, but there wasn't any one thing that stuck out.

And of course we went up to the balcony and the museum.



Even at the early hour we were up there, around 3:15pm, the sun was already starting its journey to the horizon...

Our Last Hours in Firenze

Tuesday we went to Villa I Tatti, Harvard's Renaissance studies villa. We ended up being on a private tour. Our guide Laura was hilarious and a huge fan of Bernard Berenson, the art expert who donated the place. It was a little tough to get there, the walk was up a hill with the runoff from the rains washing over the street in several places!



On the plus side, the rain had mostly stopped when we reached the villa, so the scenery was looking great.



We headed back to town to catch our train. We had a little free time so we went to get more acqua frizzante and see the Duomo one last time...

Our First Full Day in Florence!

Yesterday was our first full day in Florence. Vio and I managed to leave the house decently early. We went to Accademia, had lunch on south side of the city at a GustaPizza, a place that had been recommended by one of Vio's friends, wandered the Arno a bit including heading over Ponte Vecchio, hit up the Uffizi, saw the city center at night, and had Egyptian fast food dinner with Konrad and Heather. (Delicious hummus and roasted eggplant stuffed pita...) Our schedule has been packed, so I just have time to show you a few photos...

Saturday with the Students

Saturday I relaxed in the morning. I took my time at the breakfast buffet. I met up with Markus, Anne, and Kai at breakfast, so we could all go out sightseeing. We headed down to the Sultanahmet district. Some older tourists asked us to take their picture, and enthusiastically wanted to take ours for us! This is in front of the second gate of Topkapi Palace.



We were on our way to the Blue Mosque. I thought it was quite beautiful, but I must admit I had thought it would be bluer!



Since it's still a house of worship, you must remove your shoes and women must cover their hair.



The mosque is in great shape, it doesn't look 400 years old. The interior designs are amazing. It would be cool to be able read all the calligraphy. Most of the mosque is blocked off for worshipers, so we just sat on the carpet and admired the interior from one vantage. We started walking back toward Hagia Sophia and Topkapi, and got distracted by this candy-maker.



I treated Kai to a candy. Mine was kiwi and sour cherry. The candy doesn't harden, it's halfway between a hard candy and molasses in texture.



We sat down in the square and had a little lunch snack, before we parted ways, them for Hagia Sophia, and me for Topkapi...

Hagia Sophia

On Thursday I took a little time to see the Hagia Sophia. I think this was my favorite "sight" that I saw. When you go to see Hagia Sophia, you are too close to it to take a good picture of the outside. It's just that big. So these are all interior shots of the magnificent building!



All the mosques I visited had beautiful chandeliers. They're usually hung low, as they used to utilize oil lamps that weren't so bright and required a lot of tending. You can see them here in this shot of the interior through the Imperial Gates.



This was the largest cathedral in the world for almost a thousand years, built by Emperor Justinian. It was converted into a mosque in the 1400's. The original architectural decorations were already fairly geometric in nature, as they were in a Byzantine style. You can see some of the conversion decorations in the background here, including the giant calligraphic shields with names of prophets. You can see the incredible patterned marbles on the floor too.



Empress Zoe mosaic was neat. These are leftovers from the Christian era, I believe they were plastered over while it was a mosque.



Overall, I was really impressed with Hagia Sophia. I followed the tour in the Rick Steves guidebook I borrowed from Esther and it led me all around the building, describing the obvious stuff, and pointing out the slightly off track stuff, like the pillar of St. Gregory, with the miracles and all that. If you go to Istanbul, don't miss this place!

Last Saturday in Venice

On Saturday, we went to Saint Mark's in the morning. We went for the Golden Screen. It's pretty impressive, of course. Mary had the Rick Steves guide, and he mentioned this scene on the altar by the screen. The pillars tell the story of the four evangelists, and they have some odd images. This does look like a genie coming out of a lamp, yeah?



We decided to pass on the balcony for another day, it was just so misty out that we weren't going to really enjoy the view. You couldn't even see Giudecca and San Giorgio, totally fogged out. We headed over to Frari and San Rocco instead! There was a little flea market going on by Frari.



We had lunch then went in for visits in the churches, finishing at the Scuola di San Rocco. I bought the book that Linda had when we were there, the one on the carvings of Pianta on the upper level. Those carvings are just so cool!

On our way back to the hotel, I noticed these cute signs about acqua alta. I just like the cartoon lion they use in all these civic signs.



This building by our hotel has cool windows...



Anyway, that evening we ate quick groceries and sandwiches on the early side, as we were heading out for Il Barbiere di Siviglia at Musica a Palazzo. I don't have any pictures, as it's a "no photo" event, but we did pose for a few pictures after the show. Mary, I am looking at you! I will definitely want to see those later!