Florence & Rome Days 9 & 10

This is Florence Day 9, and Traveling from Florence to Rome, Day 10.

My photos:
Pretty much my favorite grafiti EVER:
We're on our way to the Academica (where da Vinci's David is. And that's pretty much ALL that's at the Academica). No time to stop. Saw nothing but the back of this guy ;-)
Paused to take photo of pretty Duomo.
After the Academica, we went to this shop Dad and Dar had found the night before. Yes, that's the David painted like Frank from Rocky Horror, and YES I want it.

Darin looking out of our hotel window as we pack the car.
Rome:

Little bioy with his mom.

Building at the Trevi Fountain.
The Dahli Lama

Dad's Photos:
Dad and Darin in the reflection of something at the Science museum, which I skipped.

The market where we bought water and stuff like Salami. Mmmm salami. The woman there was wonderful, and made me promise we'd come back.
Our Favorite Gelato Place!!!
Fountain on the corner of a building.

Grafiti. I love that mushroom.
Rome:

Spanish Steps
Trevi Fountain
Us throwing coins into the fountain.

Darin's Photos:
Me on Dad's lap; I'm a little too big.

Grafiti.
Rome:

Penis Pasta. Yes, Darin takes all the quality photos.

About this Internet Thing

So... the internet in Rome.

Here I am at the hotel in Rome, where I can us the internet for 1€ (these European keyboards are crazy!!! German ones are differnet from Italian ones, and they all have these crazy keys, and I can never find the @. It took me forever to find it here, and then once I found it I had to find out how to make it work. It's not one of those normal keys where you can hit shift to make the other one go - NOOO it's the THIRD one, so you have to push other keys to figure out which one makes it go.)

But anyway, I can use the internet for 1€ an hour, but I can't upload photos b/c it's not my computer. *le sigh*

So I'll briefly mention days 9 & 10. Nine was nice and relaxing, and 10 was today. Today we arrived in Rome. Well, we awoke too early (Dad and Darin), or slept just fine and awoke with a million mosquito bites (me). Then I slept in the car on the way here, and we found our hotel room to be nice and "cozy". It barely fits three beds, and I won't be able to sleep in past when Dad and Darin get up. Oh well. I'll have to find some time to nap.

We practiced using Taxis today. It was good and cheap and easy, and will end up costing us less time, money and energy than the hop on/hop off busses or the metro would. So yay!

I'm really sleepy, so it's off to bed for me because we have to be up early to go to the Vatican :-)

Love,
Carla

Florence, Day 8

Day 8 - Tuesday.


We got up early and went to the Uffizi. Yes, I think I spelled it wrong in another post. I can fix it, or you can pretend I did. This is outside the Uffizi. We couldn't take any photos inside, so there aren't many photos from Day 8. There may be even fewer photos from day 9 (today). I'm not sure yet.

Dad and Dar outside the Uffizi
Art in our hotel:
Torture device???

My new GREEN shoes... yes, this IS my THIRD pair of new shoes in Europe. I was just so shocked they had a pair of shoes in my size, that were cute and AWESOME, and comfy AND 1/2 off, that I bought them. This was while purse hunting. Dad and Dar were NOT amused with my purse hunthing.

For some reason they were tired? They only walked around a museum for 2 hours - taking turns pushing me in the wheelchair, and Darin pushed me around outside - it's not like that was anything hard haha.
I found a purse! That I can afford!
I actually found a REAL purse I could afford... and then in this shop - this purse cost 8 euros more than the REAL purse I bought. I'm a good deal finder.

Art in Hotel:
Bacon on a board?

How I spend a lot of time. And those windows across the street - the boys live there. They are amusing.

Perseus beheading Medusa.


Il Duomo. Darin: "It's kinda busy." Doors of the Baptistry by Ghiberti. Had to study these in Art History Class.
IL DUOMO!
Festival Del Gelato! I've had Gelato there twice, plus eaten Gelato at various other places, but this was by far the best. And they have my favorite flavor: Cookies. A flavor you can't get in the states, of course. *le sigh*

Art in the hotel:
Carla wears a sombrero? And this is my new ITALIA sweatshirt. I think I actually bought it in Venice, but I don't remember.

Us outside the hotel.
Eating Gelato :-) Great way to end every Italian evening!

Today, Day 9 (Wednesday) we slept in. I slept until 10:30, and Dad and Darin brought me breakfast. I am now updating this as Dad and Darin are at the science museum. They will come back, and then we will go to the Academica. If we can take photos there, I will likely post again this evening, but it's likely that we can't take photos, so there will be no photos from today to post.

Thursday we head to ROME! There will be many photos to post there, and hopefully more free internet to use!

Love,
Carla

Italy, Venice and Florence Day 7

Today we traveled from Venice to Florence. I did a lot today, and for this I am very proud! I love the hotel I picked for Florence - again, I have my own little room, which is nice. We all share a bathroom, which is only a problem when Darin does his daily 48 million hour routine. haha.

This sign was on the Vaporetto - the water taxi, and translated means, Please remember that this seat is reserved: (for - in order, A woman with a large abdominal tumor, a woman with an undeveloped Siamese twin, a man with unusual armpit hair, and Fred Astaire). I sat there anyways.


I took this after my tummy was full of yummy Florence homemade Gelato. Yum.

Here is daVinci, and that thing he's holding, that must be his code.

The two of us.

Galileo - my bathtub hero.
I just liked this...

Santa Croce
Dad's photos:

Our Venice Hotel :-) What a nice place. Could've used an elevator, but I won't complain about that since I had to walk everywhere else too. My wheelchair wouldn't have done us any good in Venice.


Rialto Bridge
Us in the hotel's "garage" in Florence.

This is why we got Gelato in cups... from another place.


David replica - We'll see the real thing in a couple days - and I'll be just as obnoxious as that cruise commercial. Just kidding, kind of.

San Antonio - Patron Saint of the Lost (Luggage). We thank him daily for the safe return of our luggage after that crazy 3 different airline mess it took to get us to Europe.

I saw this, it was awesome, and yep.

I'm watching hot guys without shirts play soccer. I guess the soccer was the reason Darin could pause to smile for the camera.

Look how little the Smart Car is!

Doing what I do best... and no, I didn't buy that purse. It was too many Euros to count.

Darin's Camera:

Father's Day in Venice - we went out to dinner and then had awesome Gelato :-)

Me and Daddy

Dar and Daddy

Darin took this awesome photo of the land of the lost locks. We're not sure what they are doing here, but it makes a cool photo.

I'm really excited to go to the Ufitzi tomorrow - ART! And me there seeing art! And everything about this continent makes me happy - thrilled even (except that shitty pizza we had for dinner, thanks to me and my lack of understanding what the woman said when I asked for directions in Italian. Go me. That was the same place as the bird eating the cone, and the birds also attacked us while we were eating. At least it was really cheap - and with the money we saved on food, Dar-Dar bought a nice leather Italian wallet. I am still searching for a purse. In that store I could have gotten a 900 Euro coat for 1/2 price, minus tax, and he would have thrown in a free leather coat for Dad - but we decided that 400 Euros is still too much for two leather coats - b/c that's $650. We're not looking to spend that much on anything).

Well tomorrow we will continue the hunt for a great (cheap) leather purse. And I will try to forget about the 900 Euro coat that was to DIE for. And I will try to forget about the 110 Euro dress that would be the best thing EVER. I'm going to forget about these things and buy postcards.

Will update tomorrow from the Land of Leather.

Lots of Love,
Carla