May 21, 2010 Florence, Itlay

I am in heaven!! I adore Florence, today I had to give my tour of the North part of Florence which was interesting. We went to see San Marco, which by the way the inside is fabulous!



After San Marco we went to the Santissima Annunziatta which I wasn't allowed to take pictures in. :( oh well, it was beautiful! The priests that we have seen when going into the churches have been super nice and explaining things to us. Right at we were leaving a mass was starting and I so wanted to stay to experience it, but the tour had to continue.

The rest of the tour was just seeing buildings but not going in them, though I did find the mercato centrale which is a huge covered market that I am going to go to tomorrow. I am determined to do some shopping and find myself a leather jacket, but I need to find someone to bring with me to haggle the prices because I am terrible at that.

Today I have also started planning some of my side trips, for instance on sunday a large group of us is going on a hiking tour in Cinque Terra, there is supposedly some breathtaking views! I can't wait!! Then next weekend I am taking a trip to Assisi, we are leaving on friday afternoon and staying until sunday. Everything is happening so fast!

So the food here in case you were unaware is the best thing by far. Today for lunch we had a delicious tomato-based pasta, a chicken cordon blue, sauted zucchini, and pineapple for dessert. For dinner I just had a small panini that was very similar to a tuna salad sandwich, it was so yummy! A lot of the people in my group are going on a bar crawl tonight which should be interesting, I however am going to keep it classy and buy myself some wine and soak in the culture by not celebrating like an American. :)