Florence: Hannibal Hunting

8:30 am:  As I turned over in my bed when I awoke, I noticed Marie was checking her phone.  Thinking that she’d been up for a while I suggested we dash downstairs before the hotel closed breakfast at 9 am.

Within minutes, we were downstairs enjoying fresh croissants with ham and cheese, croissants ladened with Nutella, pineapple yogurt and pineapple juice.  I was amused when Marie informed me that she awoke the same time I did.

Back in our room with no tours booked for the day, we got back into our respective beds and read or watched the Olympics until the heat of the day passed.

Mid-afternoon, we stepped out to the Farmacia for some heel pads and bandages to relieve Marie’s aching feet, having walked all day in flats with very little cushioning in the soles.

A stop for sandwiches at a nearby alley restaurant and then a return to Kiko beauty store for some more bargain beauty supplies.

The line for the Duomo was short.  Today we were prepared with layers to cover our shoulders and knees.  The Duomo’s interior contained magnificent works of art all around the walls, ceiling, windows, pulpit, sacristy and even the floor tiles.

I have a collection of souvenir pictorial books of famous cities and sites.  I was on a hunt for one featuring Florence.  Marie found one in a street vendor’s kiosk, but I thought I’d comparison shop from a bookstore first.  I found a similar book in a bookstore, but really liked the one at the kiosk.  With all the walking around Florence, I forgot where the vendor’s kiosk was located.  Oh well, in this heat, an ice cold granita was in order.

A little past our hotel, there’s an underground passage.  We thought we’d see if it led to the train station.  We were right!  We could use it tomorrow to avoid the traffic.  The passage was cool and lined by mall stores and outlets.  I timed the route to 5 minutes to the station from our hotel.  What a great and timely discovery.

We returned to our hotel to drop off our purchases and rest while watching more Olympics.

8:15 pm we left our hotel destined for Palazzo Vecchio.  The Palazzo Vecchio contained many small beautiful rooms full of artwork/frescoes on the ceilings and walls and a few sculptures on pedestals.

Photos were allowed, but the interior lighting, dimmed to echo candlelight, made for dark photos without flash and bright photos with flash, due to all the gleaming gold (brass?) surrounding many of the works.

I was particularly pleased with the result of this photo of the Duomo framed by a palace window.

The room for which we were particularly on the hunt, was the Room of Lilies, where, according the book, Hannibal spent much of his time meeting with officials.  I asked a docent, who had trouble translating English “lilies” for Italian “Giglio”.  When she understood I was looking for the “Salon de Giglio”, she informed us that it was the room found at the end of the self tour.  Of course.

Sure enough, at the end of the flow of rooms and after many beautiful pieces of art, much to our delight, we came to the Salon de Giglio, the most ornate and possibly the largest of the many rooms.  Here our hunt for Hannibal Lechter’s presence was achieved.

Having found the Salon de Giglio, we had only stepped into the hallway outside the room, when we decided on taking a photo in the room.  Though the two docents, heavy in conversation next to the door, saw us take one step out the door, they were suddenly very concerned that we took one step over the threshold back into the room.  They demanded to see out tickets and told us that we were entering the wrong way.  I reminded them that they watched us take photos while in the room and watched us step out for two seconds, before coming back in.  The docents calmed down and allowed us to take some photos before our final departure from the room.

Nine times out of ten one would find oneself entering a gift shop at the end of a tourist site.  This was not one of the nine.  The one time I wanted to find a gift shop for a souvenir book, I couldn’t find one.  Is it a full moon tonight?

Marie and I made our way back toward the Duomo for another dinner at Scudeiri.  Our waiter was the same guy who took our payment the other day – the one who encouraged us to leave a tip for our surly waitress.  Our waiter was slow to serve us and didn’t ask us if we wanted dessert.  We ordered 2 amaretto coladas, tortellini alla Medici, and cheesecakes, which were nothing like the New York cheesecakes at home:

Our tab included a cover charge.  Before our waiter handed us our check, we watched the customer at the next table argue with our waiter over the tip our waiter included on his check.  Sure enough, our waiter added tip onto our check, also.  When I questioned the included 15% tip, he justified that the 6€ cover charge was for the use of the village square, that money doesn’t go to anyone at the restaurant but to the city, so he should get a 15% tip for his service.  Beware: someone must have told the waiter that Americans give 15% tips, so he thought he’d cash in.

A leisurely stroll in the warm night to calm the mind of the greedy ordeal, and we were back in our hotel room, packing for our departure tomorrow morning.

I’m going to miss Florence.  I just might have to come back for more.