Giardini

We started early today with breakfast in the hotel, which included a cappucino and hot chocolate. It's been a week now and we were ready to do some laundry. We found a laundromat near the hotel and loaded up the washer and went next door to an internet café. We ordered the train tickets for tomorrow's trip to Naples online. Then while the laundry was drying, we walked around Florence. We were in the leather district and went to a leather school nearby. Everything seemed of not the best quality and was rather expensive. All the store salespeople spoke English well, probably because the area was frequented by many American tour groups. We grabbed the laundry hot from the dryer put it in the backpack and dropped it off at the hotel. We had lunch near the hotel at a restaurant called La Grotta Guelfa. Jadine ordered the pasta carbonara which was speghetti in a heavy butter sauce with pancetta. I had Le Pappardelle which was fresh pasta sheets in oil with tomatoes. We also ordered a half bottle of rose which was quite a bit better than the by the glass wines we have had. After lunch we crossed the Arno on the Ponte Vecchio and saw the little gold and silver shops that lined both sides of the bridge. We made our way to the Pitti Palace and bought tickets to the Boboli and Bardini gardens. The Boboli gardens were massive. There were some good views of Florence from atop the gardens. The Bardini gardens was a rather confusing walk from the Boboli gardens but we found it. The Bardini gardens were nicer and less crowded but harder to walk around as they were steeper. After the gardens our legs were pretty tired and we headed back to the hotel. We stopped at a gelato place and got a small cup of stracciatella and frutti di bosca which was very tasty. We got back to the hotel about 6:30 and got ready for dinner -- this time we would try the Rick Steves recommend Osteria di Porcellina. After getting ready and on the way down to the lobby, we met a guy from Arizona here with his wife. He let us know that a taxi to the train station is a good way to go when we leave tomorrow. The restaurant had decent food and not so great service. The waiter got our order wrong. We ordered salmon carpaccio but got beef, which was OK because the beef carpaccio tasted pretty good. We also got a steak in peppercorn sauce which also was pretty good. Overall we were not that impressed, the lunch spot was better. The final note on florence is that it has some old world charm mixed with new world commerce but with a little bit of a touristy feel.