On Saturday morning (630am!) we had to leave our apartment to catch our train to Florence. What an experience that was. In our group was myself, my roommates (Katie, Laura, Kristen, and Sarah), Bethany, and our guy friends (Jacob, Nick, Adam, Kyle and John). Our train was scheduled to leave at 8:22, so we all decided to be at the train station by 7:30. None of us had ever been on a train like this before so we were all a little nervous. When we got there we tried to find where our train platform was and we couldn’t find it posted anywhere. When 8:10 rolled around and there were still no postings, we were all pretty convinced our train tickets were all fakes and we would have wasted our money. Finally, we found what the platform was and validated our tickets and got on the train!
I was in a cabin by myself (without my friends) sitting next to this rather large women who snored the ENTIRE 3-hour ride. It was kind of annoying at first, but I put my Ipod in and started reading Dear John. When we went through tunnels, the popping in my ear was 10x as painful as when you are on an airplane, so that took some getting used to.
Once we got to Firenze Refredi (the train station right outside Florence) we had to take another train into the city so we could find our hostel; Hostel Veronique. No one had any idea what this place would be like, but we set out to find where Katie, Laura, Kristen, Bethany and I would be staying. It was only 10 Euro a night so we weren’t expecting much. We walked up and down the street we thought it was on, looking for a sign or even the building number. We must have walked by the same stores 8 times. We finally found a little wooden door with a small number 6 above it and Veronique posted by the buzzer. All of these signs could have fit on a notecard. When we were let inside, it was completely dark, but we managed to find the stairs and head up to the top (4th) floor. Some lady came out of her apartment and let us into the elevator and turned the lights on for us. We were all pretty sketched out at this point, but it got even worse. When we got to the top of the stairs, there were only 2 doors, neither of which said Veronique on them, but a little Italian maid opened the door and ushered us in. Another man was sitting inside waiting for us and took down our passport numbers as we paid. What made it even more sketchy was that when we handed him our money, he whipped out his own personal wallet and gave us change from it, then put our money directly into his stash. We thought we were for sure not making it back to Rome, or if we did, all of our stuff would be stolen, because our room didn’t lock from the inside, which made it very hard to sleep at night.
After our other friends had found their hostels, all with similar stories to ours, we headed to the Doumo. We paid 8 euro and climbed the 463 stairs to the top, but the view was worth all the money we had paid. We were able to look out over all of Florence and see the surrounding mountains. It was spectacular!
We then walked around the town and through all the leather markets. I have never seen so many leather purses, jackets and bracelets in my life! Each stand had some unique things, but I found that it was hard to find anything unique and different than any other stand. And everything was super expensive! My outlook on Florence was that it was set around tourists, and it was hard to find anything that was unique to Florence. On Sunday however, I managed to find a pretty cool leather purse for 35 euro! What I liked about it was that I could tell it was real leather, it said made in Italy on it, and the man who sold it to me did not hassle me to buy something. I also bought 3 bracelets and some pretty funny postcards!
The vendors at these stands hackle you to no end! They are very persistent and most of the men in Florence come off sleezy. You can find this in Rome too, but the difference was that in Rome if you ignored them, they would leave you alone. Even though it is annoying at times, I couldn’t help but laugh at some of their desparate attempts to get you to buy something. One man told Laura and I that he would give us a free purse if we could guess where in the US he was from; we were wrong of course. This was also the man that told me that because I wear my rings on my thumb and middle finger that it means I am single and sleep around. He then managed to add that that is why he wears his on his middle finger also. Like I said, sleezy.
Another incident happened when Laura and I were walking to find our friends and I glanced at a jacket I liked. A man came running over to us saying that he would give us 60% off for English speaking women. We continued to walk. He then yelled to us “I have free wine for you…and limoncello…and boyfriend…and weed…and hash…” we couldn’t help but laugh.
Before we found a place to eat for dinner we went and saw the fake David statue by Michelangelo. We didn’t have time or money to pay to see the real one (16.50 euro to see a statue…not worth it). We also went to the famous Ponte Vecchio bridge. This was really neat to see.
After dinner and Mammamia’s restaurant (so good!) we went on got some gelato that we had passed while walking around that looked really (and smelled) delicious (it was smashed between two waffles!). Once we ordered, the woman ushered us in and told us we had to pay. We didn’t notice until later, but once we were all inside, another woman blocked the door so we couldn’t leave until everyone had paid. This was probably because when we were all paying, we found out that waffle gelato is 8EURO a PIECE!! That’s $12 for ice cream… this put a damper on us enjoying our treat.
After walking and traveling all day, we were all pretty exhausted, but we relaxed at a local pub while some had a beer. When we went back to the hostel to sleep, we noticed that the beds were just two twin beds pushed together with a sheet put over the top. Because of our experience earlier with the employees of Hostel Veronique, we couldn’t help but think we would get scabies from the sheets. Laura and Kristen shared a bed, and Laura insisted on taking the gross comforter off but Kristen responded by saying “I would rather get scabies then be freezing cold.” This was after we had walked around all day freezing; there was very little sun shine and it was pretty windy as well.
The next day was pretty uneventful, we walked around freezing again and shopped some more. We climbed a ton more stairs and climbed 2 of the steepest roads I have ever seen to fill our time. By the time it was time to leave, everyone was worn out from being heckled to buy something and freezing. The trip ended with me being pooped on by a bird while waiting for our bus to get us from Termini Station to our apartment. What a way to end a weird trip. Overall, I am glad I went and was able to experience Florence, but I still enjoy Rome! It was weird how at home I felt once we got back into Rome.
Me at Ponte Vecchio
Ciao!
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