Oh! Orvieto

Yesterday was our last day in Florence andI felt a cold coming on. Oh great! I'm in Italy and I have a cold. We went on a couple of tours yesterday - the morning tour was a waking tour, which included the Duomo and the Academia Gallery. At first we were worried that it was just a walking tour and we wouldn't get to go into the Duomo or get to see the original "David" in Academia. We had already seen the outside of both, and we didn't need to see them again. We asked the tour guide, and she assured us that we would go inside. Yeah! Our guide walked us around to various sights around the centre of the city and then we got to go into the Duomo. This is one of the sights we were looking forward to. It was a little disappointing, considering how massive it is outside. There wasn't the amount of sculptures and floor detail as there was in other churches, but it is because rich families weren't allowed to donate money and bury their family members in this church. Don't get me wrong though... the church was still beautiful; the inside of the dome, stained glass, and altar were exquisite, but all the other churches we saw had a lot of sculptures and graves (either marble caskets above ground or graves in the floor). Next stop...Academia to see David. There are copies of David throughout Florence; everything from shops called David's Leather to David Gelato. David was the hero of Florence and he is known as perfection, and he is. If you are interested in a brief history of Michelangelo, read on. For those of you who aren't interested, you're going to get a history lesson anyway. From 6 to 10 years of age, Michelangelo's parents left him with a family. I don't remember why. The man of this family was a stone cutter, and this piqued Michelangelo's interest. He wanted to know everything about cutting stone. He caught on quickly and wanted to know even more. He wanted to add realism to his sculptures, and he got the opportunity to learn about anatomy by dissecting bodies. By the time his parents came to pick him up at 10 years old, he was already accomplished. His father had grand plans for him to be a professional, but Michelangelo would have nothing of that... he wanted to be a sculptor. He became a renowned sculptor and was commissioned for many projects. He also didn't believe in having a helper, which is why his projects took so long to complete. He didn't want the risk of someone messing up his work. One wrong chisel after years of work could mean disaster. Maybe that's why he lived to be 89 - because he always had a project to complete. You would not believe the detail of David - from the veins in his neck and right hand that holds the stone of his slingshot, as if he was getting psyched up to kill Goliath to the way his brows furrough as if he's thinking about his plan of attack. His eyes are even carved with the detail of eye lids and brows, and talk about a six-pack. Michelangelo decided he wanted to depict David before he killed Goliath, not after, like so many other statues. David is vey fragile because the marble Michelangelo carved with had imperfections, so he covered up the major ones, but some day David might break apart, so he is connected to a fibre optic sensor to monitor any movement. That will be a very sad day if David breaks. In the afternoon, we went on a tour of the Uffizzi - another museum. I wasn't so interested in this tour because it was all paintings and how painting has changed over the years in the Rennaisance. There were sculptures as well, but by this time, my feet were sore. I think I'm going to have to see a physiotherapist when I get home because my feet shouldn't be so sore. Anyway, the rest of the day was spent buying a piece of luggage at a street vendor to carry all our new luggage in. We knew it would be cheap, but we just need it to get us home. After that, we just spent the night in our hotel because we wanted to relax. We are now on the train going to Orvieto, and that cheap piece of luggage we bought last night - the handle broke letting it onto the train. I'll by a good one in Orvieto if I can find one.