The Uffizi to Padova

On our second morning in Florence, I awoke early and let Jeanette sleep while I took a shower. When I finished, I drew Jeanette a bath, which she loved, and then I headed downstairs to get her a coffee. While down there, I made myself a hot chocolate and relaxed for a sec in the breakfast room, but I went light on the food as I knew we'd have another day of culinary exploration ahead of us.

We got ready and checked out of our room, but left the car at the hotel so that we could explore a bit more by foot.

We walked toward the center of town, crossing over the river again to explore a bit more on the non-touristy side (if there is one). We stopped at the Santa Maria del Carmine to admire the beautiful frescoes and were very impressed with the use of perspective and color to make a towering ceiling appear even higher and more majestic.

We walked toward the Uffizi and stopped around the corner before the Ponte Vecchio to have a lunch of beef Parmesan, pannini, and pizza. Yum. We were able to explore a few antique stores and found a nice cameo for mom and saw some very neat old WWII era clothes and postcards.

We made it to the Uffizi in time to stroll around for over an hour, looking at painting after painting, statue after statue. The understatement is to say that their collection is amazing, but for me one of the most memorable pieces was a small painting of the slaying of the sea creature by Perseus (the peril of Andromeda?). Something about the rendering was a bit different from previous versions I had seen and it stuck with me. Jeanette loved the statuary and the library with the gold and abalone. It was impressive to see so many pieces that I had before only seen in books.

We left the Uffizi and strolled back toward the other side of the Ponte Vecchio. Jeanette met a nice puppy who bounced around eagerly for tips. What can you do but give him a euro?

We made it back across the bridge and purchased a red and gold filigree glass set from a nice older woman's shop (we had stopped in and chatted with her son yesterday).  Along the way, we spotted a restaurant that we had seen the day before and decided to descend the steps to see if we could have a snack.  It was late for lunch, but they were able to whip together some very tasty appetizers for us. We had wine, bread, cheese, and a plate of honey and salami that were delicious together.

Upon returning to the hotel, I promptly broke the passenger side mirror off of the car when I backed too quickly out of the narrow driveway.  As it was raining, the windshield wipers were more than happy to take pieces of the mirror and fling them across the driveway. A local woman passing by gave me a quite humorous look and Jeanette just covered her eyes as I got out and collected the pieces. Unfortunately, most of the mirror spent the rest of the trip dangling from the side of the car.

We drove toward Venice, stopping for coffee along the way at one of the very convenient rest stops. We encountered some bad traffic around Bologna and saw a semi jackknife in the rain. Itallians live up to their driving reputation in the fog and the drizzle.

As it was getting late, we decided to try our luck in Padova and take the train to Venice the next day, rather than driving all the way to Venice. Rick  Steves' maps of cities like Padova just plain suck. They're more schematic that useful. It took us a while to even find our way into the old city center and, once there, we decided to hoof it around to look for a hotel after discovering that many were booked. We ended up at an institutional place called the Casa de Pelligrino, right across from the beautiful Basilica of St. Anthony. The hotel is spotless, has many curious little items such as towel warmers, but institutional doesn't describe it. Think nuns-and-monks institutional. For something like 65 euros, it was worth it, though, and it put us in a great spot to catch a bus to the train station in the morning.

We strolled out for dinner and were promptly turned away from a pizzeria that couldn't be bothered to have patrons actually wait for a table. Europe. Venturing across the street, we came upon a quiet-looking wine bar and restaurant, called Per Bacco, that has one of the more extensive wine lists that I've ever seen. See for yourself at their website. We were lucky to have found the place. They served us each a complimentary glass of prosecco upon being seated. When a very nice waiter came over, we expressed in broken Italian and English that we didn't have any idea of what wine we might like for dinner. He offered to pair wines for us if we selected food... fantastic!

We ended up with three courses of tremendously excellent food and wine. Jeanette and I split some fresh mozzarella and pickled zucchini for an appetizer that was paired with a light red. The waiter took his time and explained why each wine went well with the food. For dinner I had a thick pasta with wild boar chunks and Jeanette had a thin spaghetti with fish eggs and a tasty, meaty green olive. The wine was a healthy local Cabernet that went with both dishes fantastically. The plates stood up for themselves as well. Finally, we tried the Italian version of a chocolate fondant and Jeanette tried a sparkling white moscato, while I had a sparkling red/rose sweet dessert wine. Both went nicely with the chocolate. At the end of the evening, if you can believe it, 8 glasses of wine, one appetizer, two meals, and a dessert came to 53 euros. We're going back as soon as we can.