Italy - Florence

Onto stop two of our romantic trip... Florence.

Everyone I have ever talked to about Italy always said the same thing "Just wait until you get to Florence"  "You will want to spend a lot of time in Florence" "My favorite city in Italy".  You can imagine the expectations I had heading into Firenze, I was expecting to be blown off of my feet.  And after falling so hard for Rome, I couldn't imagine Italy becoming more magical. 

Florence is a beautiful city.  The roads are narrower, the churches a tad more grand, and the food (in my opinion) much better.  However it did not knock me off my feet right away.  It was lovely and quaint feeling and I liked it very much, but it wasn't what I had been expecting.

It wasn't until day two of our stay in Florence that the appeal really made sense to me.  As we walked around discovering the city, things started to look really familiar to me.  I couldn't figure out why, but after passing a lot of tourist stands with chachki gifts each with little Pinocchio puppets dangling off the sides... I got it.  I think Pinocchio was born in Florence.  Every street was like the movie had come to life.  After making this realization, I was smitten.  Florence indeed has so much character.  The absolute best word I can think of to describe the town is CHARM.  Florence will charm the sock off of you. 

Villa San Michelle

The first night we went on our nice date night to what may be the best hotel setting I have ever seen.  You had to take a long twisty ride to the top of a hill to a small hotel with the most fantastic gardens.  The food was good... but the view and setting was perfection. 

 I think Nate wanted to sell me AND my camera at this point.  He was so over the pictures that he started mocking them by "posing" his GQ poses every time I wanted a picture.  Aye...

 

 

Florence

Once again I was totally charmed by the streets.  Italy sure knows how to make a city dreamy.

How delicious does this lunch look?  Light, simple yet totally amazing.  The above photo of Nate and I is on the bridge of shops you can see in the picture below.  I mean.... CHARM.