10/7 - Florence
The Naples youth hostel was great, but there were a few minor problems with it. The unisex bathroom stalls were tiny and the doors didn't lock (their weird shape consisting of 2 half-doors which opened in the direction of pressure applied to them).
The Italian McDonalds had an interesting flavour of McFlurry - Bacio. It was like rich chocolate fudge with crunchy bits inside and extremely nice. Other flavours: Caramel, Smarties, Kit Kat.
We took the 11:30-15:06 direct train up to Naples, through Rome. We checked 1 night in advance (in case there was anything else we wanted to do in Naples), but earlier trains were sold out. Meanwhile, though only 1st class tickets were left on this one, it was cheaper than later 2nd class trains with 1 connection. Go figure. Maybe it was a last minute special.
Perks of First Class:
- Free newspapers (all in Italian though)
- Free moist towelettes
- Free apricot confection
- Free plastic cup of drink
Even most young Italians have bad English. No wonder you see none of them on exchange.
Another reason individual toilet cubicles may be segregated into male/female may be to prevent guys from dirtying all of them. On the train to Florence someone hadn't flushed the male toilet and it was quite dirty. I peeked into the female one, and it looked somewhat less disgusting. Then again, given what I heard about the toilets in LT2.5 last time and given hover pissing...
On arrival in Florence, we tried to get city maps. The tourist office at the train station had plenty of maps for €1 each. Unfortunately, the maps seemed to be in every language conceivable except for English, so I got a Dutch one (the languages were only for the place descriptions anyway). By the time we got to our camping site, it was too late to do most things, especially as the city was a bit away. So we went to San Miniato which was nearby.
San Miniato from bottom of stairs
Cemetery
Florence from San Miniato
Monks chanting
Monks chanting
The tip about the monks chanting came from my guidebook, so yes, guidebooks are good.
Monks
They used a synthesiser to get their starting notes, heh. They weren't as old as I expected, but then this is Italy.
Some weren't disciplined and looked at the audience and scratched themselves.
Walls
Altar
Frescoes in Chapel of the Cardinal of Portugal (?), wall and ceiling
The light in here cost €1/5 mins.
Sketch on wall in main building
City Wall. "Centro Storico di Firenze", World Heritage Site
View from South Bank
River
Bridge - Ponte Vecchio
For dinner we went to a place recommended by both our guidebooks - Borgo Antico. The waitresses were all ~18 year old female brunettes clad in staff T-shirts and half-thigh skirts, and all but 1 had a ponytail. The place was very Americanised, being unlike other Italian joints - some would say that is bad, but I was happy since it meant the staff spoke and the menu was in English (I was neutral about the American music)! We asked for 1L of aqua naturale but got 920ml only. Actually I suspect most Italian places do that.
We had wild boar sausage, which sounded quite exotic. I at least was expecting something warm but we got an un-warm platter with slices of what looked like and had the texture of lap cheong. Unfortunately, especially given the price, I didn't really like the taste. Must've been the spices inside. Luckily the meal was the best Italian food I'd had so far there.
The toilet in the restaurant was cool - it had a springy toilet seat: its default state was up but you could sit on it while doing your business. The moment you got it it'd spring back to its default position. This solved the twin problems of men not raising the toilet seat before peeing and hover pissing with the seat cover down!
We seemed to have brought a curse upon the establishment; both of us were seated facing each other across a small table, and just beside us there were 2 more seats in a similar configuration, with the table touching ours. 3 couples sat down beside us, but all got up before ordering their food.
2 chefs and the waitress in Borgo Antico posing for Andrew
We saw a "X Cinema" - it seems the rumours are wrong. The pornography industry has made its way even into Italy (though I hadn't seen their influence before this evening).
There was a free (charity) concert being held at St Mark's English Church by some female Japanese pianist, so we went to watch.
Drawing in St Mark's English Church. Caption as you will
Some pieces have to be heard in person. Chopin's Scherzo No 2 is one. Recordings can't hold a candle to live performances.
Mountains of Gelato
Portal, road up.