Skip to main content

31 Days of Traveling to Europe: Day 23 - Our Last Day in Florence

An artist creative way of decorating a no entry sign



The first thing we saw today was Michelangelo's David. It was so beautiful and amazing. We made a quick run to check out of one hotel and check into another one and went to the Uffizi Gallery. This place was huge but we saw as much of it as we could.


Brunelleschi's Dome reflected in the windows of the Uffizi.








Here are some more sights of Florence.








When we headed to the hotel to meet up with our tour group, things got a little nerve wracking. We met our guide and he knew nothing about us going to Rome after Venice. We discovered that instead of being at the beginning of a three-day tour, we were joining a ten-day tour that was going on to Milan after Venice. He tried to calm our concerns and told us that he would contact his office first thing in the morning but we had to figure out a way to prove that the company was supposed to provide transportation to Rome for the two of us.

We tried to enjoy our dinner and get to know some of our travel companions. There were friends from Sydney, Australia; a mother and daughter from Perth, Australia; and grandparents and a granddaughter from Conroe, Texas. Our meal was good but we had knots in our stomach worrying about how we were going to get to Rome.

I don't know what we would have done without the very kind young woman who was working at the hotel's front desk. We paid 5 euros for 20 minutes of Internet, found the tour information online, emailed the link to the hotel desk, the woman printed it off for us, and we gave it to the tour guide. We then went upstairs for a restless night of sleep.

Lesson learned - bring all documentation with you. All of it. Hopefully the issue will be resolved first thing in the morning tomorrow and we can enjoy Venice.


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Five Minute Friday: Roots

Lisa-Jo Baker (lisajobaker.com) hosts a weekly event on her blog called "Five Minute Friday". The rules are 1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.. So here's my first try at this. Today's topic was Roots. Roots – I think about my grandparents who lived on a farm until my grandfather’s diabetes worsened and they moved to a town with a hospital nearby. My father still says he wished he could have kept that farm. I think of my grandmother who was a widow for 20 years. Every year she would stand over my PaPa’s grave, wishing she was with him. I think of my parents, a product of those grandparents, how hard my father worked to put 2 girls through
10 comments
Read more

Five Minute Friday: Time

Five Minute Friday is a writing event that has writers spending five minutes writing on the same topic and then sharing them at http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/ . This week's word is Time. Sometimes time feels like this, like we are in it. Standing inside it, watching life pass by. It is so easy to get stuck in a time - in our pain, in our hurt. We hear the ache tick away in our head like a giant clock. Time, instead, is a gift. More time with family, more time to accomplish goals, more time to see the world. When you are hurting, it seems like time takes forever. One day turns into another day, turns into another day. When we hate a job, the five days of time that make up a work week seem to go on forever. But those five days are also a gift. Because these days, a job is not a guarantee. I want to see time as gift, not as a chore. I want to be on the other side of it, wishing there was more of it. Making the most of every hour, minute, and second instead of
6 comments
Read more

Five Minute Friday: Mercy

Mercy, this is a tough one for me. I think that's why I waited until Saturday to do Five Minute Friday. I didn't want to face the topic of mercy. I am thankful everyday for God's tender mercies. The first definition of mercy that came up when I googled the word was compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm.  This definitiion is my life in a nutshell. How many times has God extended this to me when I deserved to be turned into a pillar of salt like Lot's wife. How many times have I ignored his laws and his proddings and done exactly what I wanted to do. Every time he forgives me and prospers me. Every. time. I know there are people I should show mercy to. People who have broken my heart into more pieces than I can count. I think that I am showing mercy by keeping my disappointment in silence. In a day and age with social media, I could have told everyone that follows them how they have hurt me but I ha
7 comments
Read more