Pisa and Florence

After our exhausting, frustrating, but memorable day in Rome we floated up to the Tuscan region of Italy and docked at the port of Livorno.  But again, we didn't see any of Livorno, we took a bus to Pisa, then on to Florence.  The trip from the port to Pisa is only about 30 minutes, but it's another hour to Florence, so again, our time was pretty limited here, but we still made the most of the day.

Unfortunately it was a bit rainy this day, but there was never a complete downpour so we managed just fine. 

We had just a quick 45 minute stop at Cathedral Square in Pisa, to see the famous sites and snapped a few pictures as well.
 

Seriously, the person we asked to take the picture, first did not pose us well at all, and then she cut the top off the tower.  Oh well. We had to take this token picture.

Again she cut the top off the tower

So I decided to take the camera into my own hands to get the whole thing

Cathedral Square

It was back on the bus to head into Florence now.  We reserved tickets to go inside the Accademia, where Michelangelo's statue of David is,  and while it is kind of expensive for how small it is, it still was pretty spectacular to see.  We use our Rick Steve's Audio guide to take us through the museum and enjoyed the experience overall. 

So, I did totally sneak a picture of David

We didn't have time to do the Uffizi, but we spent the rest of the day just pretty much roaming the streets of Florence and enjoying the more relaxing day, after being so rushed in Rome.  Of course you can't miss the Duomo in Florence, such an interesting mix of colors and styles.

Florence Cathedral -pretty spectacular building

Waiting in Line to go inside the Duomo, of course Adam couldn't pass up the pizza.

Are you getting tired of the close up, self taken shots?  Asking people to take pictures of us is not my favorite thing to do, so we have a lot of there.

The last judgement

 Continued strolling took us to Pointe Vecchio and Plazzo Vecchio.  I grabbed my last Italian Gelato, since Florence was our last stop in Italy for the cruise.  We enjoyed the shops and many statues that surround the Plazzo and just people watching for a few minutes. 

Not the real David

All kinds of statues of David everywhere in Florence.

We enjoyed the day in Florence and I am thankful to be able to see some very beautiful pieces by Michelangelo, including one of his Pieta, which I was very moved by.   Although I hear the one in St. Peter's Basilica is  quite marvelous...can you tell I am still upset that I didn't get inside!?.  At least I got to see one by Michelangelo right?

It was quite a busy day, but we managed to stay up late to make it to the Chocolate Buffet and the spectacular show they had that night.  Seriously, Norwegian Cruise Line had way better shows and entertainment than our first cruise on Carnival.  I am talking world class dancers and/or musicians, every night. We were very pleasantly surprised at the great caliber of acts they brought in.  And the ship was much smaller than our first ship, and while at first I felt disappointed that things were not quite as grand as they were on our first cruise, we actually ended up liking the smaller ship feel, All the seats in the Startdust Theater were good and you only had to get there a minute or two early.  We loved it.

Oh - did I mention the Price Family was on our ship. I grew up babysitting their kids!

Too bad most of it was dry and not very good.

  So yeah, did you catch that picture of Doug and Tracy Price?  Some of the three to five people who are actually still reading this will recognize them.  Randomly they were my ward growing up and they actually moved to Virginia last year, but here they were on our same cruise ship, and their room was just one door down from ours.  We enjoyed running into them on several occasions and even spent the whole day in Istanbul with them. 

Some of the staff and chefs on the ship during their big show.

Only two more posts people.  We're almost there!