Day 14 - A little more Florence

Tuesday, May 25th - We had a full day to explore Florence and I was pretty excited - it's the home of the Statue of David! Our first stop of the morning was a leather demonstration - again I wasn't too interested plus all the guy did was show us how to make a leather box. After the "demonstration" we were pointed in the direction of the shop but I wasn't interested in what seemed to be a blatant money grab, similar to the perfume factory tour. A bunch of us skipped the shopping and headed to a bistro for some coffee and pastry. Again the coffee was delicious and Sukhey and I shared some kind of caramel pastry - so yummy! After our coffee break we had a walking tour planned to show us the sights of Florence. Right before our tour Sukhey and I ducked into a Chanel store to check out a bag she wanted to buy, it was 1700 Euros. We spent the next 10 minutes trying to figure out if it was cheaper to buy it in Florence or the States in the end she decided to hold off.

We then started our guided tour, the first part was alright - we sat on some stairs in Piazza della Signoria and our guide showed us the different statues and explained their history. She also explained a bit of the history of Florence which I found interesting. We then headed out for a walking tour and it was hard to hear our tour guide and the streets were full of tourists, way too many people for my liking. I noticed there was quite a lot of good shopping in one of the alleyways that we were in so I suggested we split off from the group and do some shopping. The H&M in Florence had heaps of great things, I spent about 50 Euros but left with 7 items - not bad. My next purchase wasn't as economical, we went into a Guess shoe store and I found a pair of black heels that I fell in love with. 130 Euros later I left the store with a killer pair of heels - I try not to think that it cost me $175 Canadian. I would never spend that much money at home on a pair of shoes!

We had a few hours to ourselves in Florence but it didn't leave enough time to do much sightseeing, the ques were too long. I wanted to go to Accademia Gallery to see the actual Statue of David but there wasn't enough time. We decided to grab lunch at a restaurant that Sukhey, Jas and I had seen during our walking tour the night before. It was really busy when we first got there and we had to wait for a table but it cleared out pretty fast. This was one of my favourite meals of the trip - the food, the company and the wine was perfect. We were a bit disillusioned by Florence (it was too touristy) and this meal definitely saved it. After we took it upon us to explore a bit and then stopped for another glass of wine. The afternoon flew by and it was time to catch the coach back to the hotel.

We got all dressed up for our Tuscan dinner and for Ali's birthday. We also had our official group photo of the tour, it turned out pretty good - we had Florance as our background and everyone looked great. Dinner was pretty decent, Sian told us it would be the best food on the tour. It was definitely the best organized dinner of the tour (that I went to). We had authentic antipasto and the rest of the courses were great. After dinner everyone went to "Space Disco." It was a pretty fun night, almost everyone from Contiki came out. I stayed until the very end caught a cab home with Matt F and Ben.

Exact Replica of Statue of David

Shots for Ali's birthday

Florence Lunch