Allora..

So, we had reached the penultimate day in Venice. We had noon train tickets so no time to do much on our last morning.. we spent it wandering back to try for a last coffee at Tonolo, the most delightful cafe in Venice, where one eats dainty zabaglione-filled choux horns with coffee served in fine blue and white cups. The kids' unerring radar had previously located a store window on the way there with old-timey tin space ships and wanted to return, so this pretty much covered the morning. To get ourselves and the heavy bag to the train station, I decided to humor the requests for a ride in the "beautiful boats" and chartered a gondola to take us there-- it pleased Anselm, too, that I got to do something I hadn't done before. We had a leisurely 40 minute ride through some back canals, past the fire station (pictured), the famous universities and architecture schools of the city, and a stretch on the Grand Canal before arriving calmly in time for our train. Perfetto.

The train ride to Florence was very comfortable, and we arrived in time for a rest in our new room and an evening walk through the city. Anselm discovered his favorite ice cream flavor-- frutti di bosco-- right by Santa Maria Novella, and the treat buoyed the kids through a very long walk. We came upon the Duomo where Anselm loved seeing Ghiberti's baptistery doors that he'd studied in the original at the SAM (the panels here were copies). Eliot found her true love in the same place: the horses that pull carriages around the city. We spent a long time there as she stared, enraptured, at one after the other. We followed a route down toward the Uffizi square, stopping for dinner (risotto for me, plain pasta with meat sauce for the kids) and then happening upon delight number two, an old-fashioned carousel that Eliot had to be forcibly detached from after two or three goes. We finally ended up down at the river where we had a beautiful view back over the Ponte Vecchio.

Blaise arrived late from Graz and we spent the next day together in Florence. The highlight was a trip to the Uffizi.. we managed to spend almost two hours there, and both kids were very interested in the art. Blaise and Anselm did a serious art tour; Eliot was engaged by the stories, particularly the sadder parts (Jesus' mom crying for him, etc) which seem to ignite her imagination. We were grateful also about the loss of the second of Anselm's front teeth, which had been pushed out at right angles by the replacements growing down.