Day 22 - Last Day in Florence
La Milkeria, Duomo, Baptisery and La Giostra
July 13, 2023: This is our last day in Florence. Tomorrow we take a train to Milan where we will spend the weekend before heading to London. So it was a low key day with breakfast at a place called La Milkeria where I had some delicious pancakes with cream and strawberries and a cappuccino. Next we finished our tour of inside of the Duomo and the Baptistery. Our ticket was good for two days so we decided to go early today right when it opened and wasn’t as busy. Jimm had been able to see the dome close up during his climb to the top. I was only able to see in from the floor of the church. It was still impressive. The church is huge inside. It is hard to believe it was built so long ago before modern machinery existed. We learned that they use oxen and pully systems to bring materials to the top. No wonder it took so many years to complete any projects of that magnitude.
Under the church is the Crypt of Santa Reparata. In the crypt, the world-famous builder of the dome of Florence, Brunelleschi, and some important figures of the Medici family, the ruling family of Florence, are buried.
The Florence Baptistry is under repair at the moment, but we were still able to go in and view it. The Baptistery is one of the oldest buildings in the city, constructed between 1059 and 1128 in the Florentine Romanesque style. The Baptistery is renowned for its three sets of artistically important bronze doors with relief sculptures. The south doors were created by Andrea Pisano and the north and east doors by Lorenzo Ghiberti. We saw the originals in the museum. Michelangelo dubbed the east doors the “Gates of Paradise.”
When we were done with our tour of the buildings, we headed back to our apartment to start our packing process. It has been a wonderful experience here in Florence. We fell in love with the city. The location of our accommodations was perfect. We were able to walk everywhere. We learned the streets, we shopped at the grocery store, we took trains, we found where the best gelato shops were located and the best restaurants. One of those restaurants was La Giostra. We went there early on in our trip and loved it so much we made a reservation for our last night. So after packing and prepping for our departure, we headed out to dinner. Unfortunately, the chef we met the first night was not there, but the food did not disappoint. We had caprese salad, pasta and their amazing warm cheese cake drizzled with raspberry sauce…all accompanied with a great bottle of Chianti Classico.
Tomorrow we say farewell to Florence and we continue our adventures. We have completed 22 of our 57 days, 35 days to go!
Jimm’s rating for the day: ****