Il Dolce Viaggio: Florence

Even though I tried to manage my expectations it was hard not to look forward to Florence as a highlight of our six week road trip in Italy. It was the last of Italy's "big three" that we hadn't visited as a family, although I had been there on my own thirty years previously. My list of sights and restaurants was almost as long as in Rome and the Mercato Centrale was legendary. We also had the Chianti region to the south in case we had time for a road trip. Our Airbnb had a great location on Via Ghibellina in the historical center, a fifteen minute walk from the Duomo but just two minutes from Mercato di Sant’Ambrogio. This set us up for breakfast in the market before an exploration of the entire center on foot.

The Sant'Ambrogio market is nowhere near the size of Mercato Centrale but it takes pride in being the oldest public market in Florence, having been completed one year before its counterpart in the center. Both markets were designed by Giuseppe Poggi, the architect who was tasked with reshaping the entire city in the mid nineteenth century during its brief stint as the capital of the newly unified country of Italy. Sant'Ambrogio was created to satisfy the needs of the local population of the neighborhoods in what at the time was the eastern edge of the city.

It was too early for the restaurants to be open but there were plenty of delis with cooked food as well as produce stands surrounding the building. We worked up an appetite browsing through colorful racks of farm-fresh fruits and vegetables and touring the aisles filled with butchers and cheese shops. I bought a container of cold tripe salad at the busiest deli while Mei Ling and the kids had a more typical breakfast at the one cafe that was open in the center of the market.

Thus fortified we set off towards the center and soon ran into Piazza di Santa Croce, a vast rectangular space surrounded on three sides by remarkable three to five story buildings and on the other by the fourteenth century Basilica di Santa Croce, the largest Franciscan church in the world. The basilica's tombs are a who's who of Italian cultural history, including those of Michelangelo, Galileo, and Machiavelli as well as an honorary sarcophagus for Dante Alighieri, who is buried elsewhere.

A few blocks further west was Piazza San Firenze which once bordered the original Roman city walls, the last of which were demolished in the mid nineteenth century. Today the piazza is most notable for the distinctive pointed belltower of the Badia Fiorentina monastery and the medieval castle which houses the Museo Nazionale del Bargello.

These first two piazzas and the streets around them had not been notably congested but the atmosphere changed dramatically as we approached Piazza della Signoria, one of Florence's most popular attractions. We entered the piazza behind the Fountain of Neptune and the kids began to snicker as we drew closer to the sea deity's sculpted buttocks. The ornate fountain was commissioned by the Medici duke of the city in the sixteenth century to celebrate his son's marriage. The section of the piazza near the fountain was packed with a confluence of tour groups which made photography a rather complicated undertaking. Several iconic buildings surrounded the piazza, most prominently the Palazzo Vecchio. This imposing Gothic fortress was once the seat of city government and is notable for its soaring medieval clocktower. On the southern side of the square stands the fourteenth century Loggia dei Lanzi whose wealth of Renaissance sculpture now advertises the wonders of the legendary Uffizi Gallery behind it.

We walked north up hectic Via dei Calzaiuoli in the direction of the Duomo. Expensive boutiques took advantage of the heavy traffic between Florence's two most popular piazzas. As we walked past Piazza della Repubblica we caught sight of the Arcone on its western side. This late nineteenth century neoclassical triumphal arch is rarely noted among Florence's architectural highlights, perhaps because it is such a late arrival to the city, but we loved the multiple levels of columns and the noble archway through which the street continued to the western parts of the old town. Even though the arch has been in place for more than hundred years, many still mourn the loss of the historic Mercato Vecchio neighborhood that was demolished to create the piazza.

After a few more minutes we arrived at the city's main attraction. There are hardly enough superlatives to describe the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, known to all as the Duomo of Florence. Filippo Brunelleschi's iconic brick dome was the largest ever constructed in Western Europe at the time of its completion in 1436. For various reasons the façade was left unfinished until the late nineteenth century when it was finally completed in a stunning geometric design composed of white, green, and red marble. This style, variably known as Tuscan Romanesque or Italian Gothic, was strongly influenced by the much older façade of the Siena cathedral. The multiple elements of the Duomo including the façade, the dome, the belltower, and the baptistery are very difficult to absorb immediately and a large crowd was milling around the piazza attempting to find the best angles from which to appreciate the entire structure.

We got an idea of what the Duomo might have looked like during the Renaissance when we walked past the Basilica of San Lorenzo just a minute's walk from the Duomo. The parish church of the Medicis was left permanently unfinished due to lack of funding. Michelangelo designed the inner façade and got as far as constructing a wooden model of the white marble outer façade. There has been some discussion in recent years of completing the façade based on Michelangelo's model but no definitive plans seem to have been made at this time.

We almost missed the Mercato Centrale due to the extensive leather goods market that was operating in street stalls along Via dell'Ariento. The cast-iron and glass design, inspired by Les Halles in Paris, was hidden behind eight foot walls of jackets and handbags. Google Maps alerted us that we should find an opening between the vendors and enter the building directly behind them. The first floor of the market was as glorious as I had expected with large stalls stocked with meticulously arranged delicacies designed to appeal to both visitors and well-appointed locals.

We had timed our arrival at the market to coincide with the lunch hour and I had already researched where to obtain the most authentic exemplar of the Florentine specialty of lampredotto. This variation of tripe is made from the dark and fatty fourth stomach of the cow, simmered in broth, and typically served in a bowl or on a roll. The famous stall in Mercato Centrale is Bambi Trippa e Lampredotto and we seemed to be the only tourists in on the secret. Most of the other patrons looked like workers who were on their lunch break from blue collar jobs and they were all ordering the house specialty. We got in line and ordered both the sandwich and the freestanding version of lampredotto with miniature bottles of house red wine with an eponymous Bambi label. This is the kind of food that is exactly up Mei Ling's alley and she wolfed hers down enthusiastically. I finished mine as well but it was a little oily and rich for my taste.

One of my few vague memories from visiting Florence in 1996 was standing on the upper floor of the market and surveying the glorious variety of produce and olives and fresh meat that was available. That version is now a relic of history as somewhere about ten years ago the market was renovated and the upper floor was converted into an enormous food hall with about thirty different restaurants and a cooking school. The ground floor hadn't been too crowded but the upper level was a madhouse with packed communal tables and long lines at many of the popular restaurants. I made the mistake of sitting the kids at the first restaurant they approved of which was an overpriced barbecue. After we had already ordered I toured around the whole level and found several places that looked considerably more appetizing. All the offerings were basically Italian which I thought was appropriate considering the setting. Mei Ling and I had already used up our full caloric allotment for lunch on the lampredotto so we were unfortunately out of commission at the food hall.

Now that we had accomplished the most vital mission of the day we realized that the leather market outside provided a good opportunity to resolve the issue of gifts and souvenirs for our family friends. Mei Ling identified a suitable vendor and engaged in a spirited round of haggling that eventually resulted in the purchase of three nearly identical leather wallets, ideal for pre-teen boys. Encouraged by this successful transaction, the vendor attempted to interest Mei Ling in a handbag but she found the material unsuitable. I hoped at this point that this marked the end of our leather shopping but it turned out that the experience had only whetted Mei Ling's appetite for a bargain. For the next hour or so we plied the small streets around the market in search of the perfect bag for the perfect price, ultimately without success.

We had now accomplished most of our day's itinerary ahead of schedule and the afternoon had brought some of the hottest and most humid weather we had experienced in Italy to date. Florence sits at the bottom of a valley and tends to run somewhat hotter than the surrounding plains. Eventually we sought refuge within the air-conditioned confines of a bookstore with a substantial selection of English language books. While the kids browsed I weighed the advantages of three different museums I had listed in my notes. I knew the best of the three would be the Leonardo Interactive Museum. The big problem here was that we had already visited a rather boring Leonardo da Vinci museum in Milan and the kids would never agree to an apparent re-run just two weeks later. Museo Galileo would have been interesting for me but didn't seem to have a lot of interactive exhibits. I ultimately settled on the Museum of Illusions which was quite close to the bookstore and seemed from the reviews to be a big hit with children. Once we had paid the rather steep admission price and entered the facility I recognized the similarity to the Museum of Light that we had visited in Rome. They are sister facilities and there is some overlap between the exhibits, but fortunately there were plenty of differences as well and our kids tend to have fun with these types of conceptual activity. The highlight of the museum was a room we almost missed that appeared to be filled with knockoffs of classic paintings such as Starry Night and The Son of Man. When the lights went off the paintings were illuminated one by one and somehow elements within them became animated and moved around the wall and into other paintings, which then became activated and the process would continue. I was so stupefied by the display that I completely forgot to make a video of the show.

By the time we left the museum the worst of the afternoon heat had passed and it was more comfortable to move around in the streets. We wandered around the center for a while without any particular agenda before coming across an absolutely perfect little square called Piazza de' Cimatori, named for the cloth cutters who used to work along adjoining streets. Many pedestrians were passing through here but there were no crowds because there weren't any "sights", except for a half dozen little restaurants and the street kiosk that some claim sells the best tripe and lampredotto in Florence.

We began to work our way down towards the Arno on Via Calimala. We made a contribution to a street artist who was drawing incredible reproductions of Renaissance paintings with chalk on the slate flagstones. Next we arrived at the Mercato del Porcellino within a sixteenth century loggia. From the name one might have hoped to sample some of Tuscany's best salumi here, but alas it was yet another thicket of leather vendors. The main reason everyone goes here is to rub the snout of the bronze boar which has become burnished over the centuries of caresses. There is also a tradition of putting a coin into the boar's mouth and letting it drop onto the grate below. If the coin goes through the grate then your wish will be granted or you will one day return to Florence or something like that. The coins under the grate supposedly go to support an orphanage, and the rest presumably go to the disheveled guy who stands by the boar all day and provides moral support.

Via Calimala segued into Via Por Santa Maria and then we were at the Ponte Vecchio. As amazing as Florence is to see, it is heartbreaking to think how much more it could have been had the Nazis not blown up all the medieval bridges spanning the Arno except for the Ponte Vecchio. The true story of how the Ponte Vecchio survived may never be fully known, but some say that Adolf Hitler personally instructed that the bridge be spared while others claim that a lowly Florentine laborer disabled the mines. In medieval times it was common for bridges to serve a dual purpose as a crossing and as a marketplace, but now of course the Ponte Vecchio stands alongside the Ponte di Rialto in Venice as the only two survivors of this custom in Italy. In the sixteenth century the Medici ruler of Florence, in an attempt to clean up the environment, decreed that only goldsmiths and jewelers could establish businesses on the bridge. This tradition has continued to this day but as with the Grand Bazaar of Istanbul a substantial amount of the business involves high margin transactions with naive tourists. The Ponte Vecchio is not a place to buy jewelry without a great deal of knowledge of the subject. As one might imagine the span of the bridge was quite a hectic scene with street performers and a high concentration of visitors from all over the globe hunting for the perfect selfie. We eventually walked one bridge over to the reconstructed Ponte Santa Trinita to get the best shot of Ponte Vecchio - from a distance.

On the other side of the Arno was the Santo Spirito district, the closest thing we had experienced in Florence to a "real" neighborhood where life revolved more around the needs and activities of its residents than the tourists who had strayed across the river. It is Florence, so of course there's an enormous Renaissance church, but those who come to the area just see the Basilica di Santo Spirito will probably be disappointed after having already viewed the ornate masterpieces of the center. Adjacent to the basilica is Piazza Santo Spirito, an expansive square surrounded by cafes with alfresco seating. I preferred the much more intimate Piazza della Passera, hidden amid a nest of residential alleys.

The only thing left on my itinerary was the famous view of the old city from Piazzale Michelangelo atop Monte alle Croci. It would take us half an hour to walk over a mile to the spot but our car wasn't much closer. Besides, it seemed unlikely we would find a place to park up there anyway. The kids grumbled a bit when I told them we had another long walk to complete on top of everything we had already done, but the worst heat of the day had already dissipated and the first part of the trek along the Arno wasn't bad at all. Climbing the switchbacks up the steep hill was the worst part but eventually we were rewarded with the familiar view from paintings and postcards. The piazzale was constructed in the period following Italy's unification in the nineteenth century and naturally contains a bronze replica of Michelangelo's David, but is otherwise undistinguished in terms of architectural wonders. Enterprising vendors sold the usual plastic souvenirs and tasteless T-shirts from pop-up stalls. I had hoped to time our visit to the piazzale with sunset, but if we had stopped for dinner first we would have been too late and now we were too early. A blazing sun still hovered in the western sky, washing out the colors of the city and reflecting off the haze surrounding the mountainous background. The wide staircase on the western side of the piazzale was already packed with travelers despite sunset still being almost an hour away.

The seafood restaurant we went to at the base of the hill had uniformly amazing reviews but there was nothing remarkable or particularly creative about the food we were served. The clams in the mixed seafood stew tasted about a day off and Mei Ling extracted them to a separate plate. By the time we returned back to our Airbnb via the Ponte alle Grazie the sun had almost completely disappeared over the horizon. At the center point of the bridge one of Clet Abraham's Common Man sculptures had been installed striding confidently off a pylon. Although these sculptures are somewhat minimalist compositions of monochromatic metal, a series of pranksters had added a collage of paint and stickers to its surface as well as a salmon-colored fright wig. With that kind of appearance it was a little more understandable why this common man might have decided to end it all in the Arno. A few blocks from home we found ourselves in Piazza di Santa Croce once again, now illuminated by an eerie light reflected off the façade of the basilica.

In the morning we'd already decided on a road trip into Chianti instead of another day slogging through the heat and crowds of Florence. We retrieved the car from the garage but one little matter was nagging at us, the poor quality pictures of the city from Piazzale Michelangelo the night before. We decided to see if there was anywhere to park the car at the top of the hill that morning on our way out of town so that we could remedy that one flaw from the previous day's amazing walk through Florence. Surprisingly enough most of the parking spots adjacent to the piazzale were empty and they appeared to be legal, or at least legal enough for temporary purposes. We went back to the balcony and got our much improved photos and then for good measure another friendly tourist offered to photograph us all together with the city in the background.

Florence had provided us with an excellent day of sightseeing but now it was time to move beyond the city borders and explore the wider region of Chianti. I had a long list of towns and other destinations and it would be interesting to see if we could make it to all of them in one day.