Europe 2nd Trip - Florence, Italy (Day 8)

1st Nov 2013, Friday, Sunny

My Breakfast

Today is an important day for one of my friend, as we are going to The Mall for branded goods shopping. But first, for the 1st half of the day, we will be going Galleria dell'Accademia first to see the famous work by Michelangelo, David. And so, we woke up at around 6am, got ready to go for our adventure today. I went out first and told my friend to remember to take the key and so i closed the door behind me. After walking for a short distance, i heard commotion coming out from our room. So i turned back and opened the door again, i saw my friend like in shock, frozen at her spot. Then on the floor, there was a plank-like stick. Hahaha....then my friend started to scream at mi and asked mi what did i do to the door, the plank fell just a few centimeters away from my friend. And the other friend was standing behind her, saw the whole drama. Then we all broke into laughter.....So drama....the door wasn't even closed when i closed it, how the hell the plank will fall down?? (but later when i went to see in the next morning, blue stack was actually used to stick the plank.) After the shock, we went down to have our breakfast. It was a bit sad on the breakfast, nothing nice to eat (i still miss the breakfast in Naples hotel......kekeke)....After we had our breakfast, i went to ask the hotel owner on how to go to bus terminal so that we can take the bus down to The Mall.

David (Taken from Web)

And so, we headed out to the Galleria dell'Accademia first as i had made the reservation at 9.30 am slot. We were required to queue for a while as there was security check required and there were security guards to control the crowd. Then we made our way in and got the admission tickets. As usual, 1 went off on her own and mi and another friend walked together. In there, the main highlight was the super big statue of David by Michelangelo. It was really big and no photography is allowed in the gallery. But i can still see some people had secretly took photos of the amazing statue using their phones. There were some other sculptures (by Michelangelo) and a collection of Renaissance paintings.  Apparently, i got no collection of other sculptures or paintings, except the giant statue of David...hahaha......There was a room of music instruments collection too. For this gallery, it wasn't as big as Vatican Museum or Borghese Gallery, so we ended the tour quite early. After this, we walked towards Florence Cathedral. The whole cathedral was super big, and it was also crowded when we reached there. It was amazing, it was so big and tall that you feel small just by standing in front of it. It was very white and there was lights shinning on it during the night. When i first saw it, i can't help 'wow', it was breathtaking and Baptisterium San Giovanni was beside it......But it was considered a public holiday today in Italy, and so the cathedral was closed. We were unable to enter to see the inner of the Duomo, which was one of the top 10 UNESCO World Heritage in Italy (which is a pity).

Gucci Outlet @ The Mall

So had no choice, we headed down to The Mall instead. We went and took a bus to the main train station and i got lost in the direction, i wasn't able to find the next direction where we need to walk to the bus terminal. So my friends took over and tried to find the direction, well, they managed to find the way to walk to the bus terminal (they are more expert in using google maps..hohohoho). Just as we reached the terminal, the next bus was 10 something, which we needed to catch this bus. If not, we have to wait like an hour for the next bus. Luckily, we did managed to catch the bus and off we went (Ticket costs euro $5 single way, euro $10 return trip). It was an 40 mins or so journey to the outlet, i just napped on the bus (so tired after waking up for so many days). Finally we reached the mall, and we went to the canteen for lunch. It's a bit sad, cos it was like a food court except you need to order first before you can choose your choice of pizza or salads. Anyway, it was a sad lunch, don't like it....After lunch, we started our shopping. First stop, Prada, my friend wanted to go there see see. Haiyo, it was crowded and it was like marketplace. The place was big though and it was 2-storey high, lower level was with bags, wallets and shoes and the upper level was with clothes, jackets, etc. Next stop, Gucci, it was also big with 3 levels and it was not so crowded, quiet. Really can slowly shop and see slowly, and indeed i saw a key pouch that i like the feel of it. So i just bought it...kekeke...my friends were still looking out for theirs. I was the first one to start the ball rolling...hahhaa...Later one of my friend got 2 wallets and 1 got a bag and a coin pouch.

Yummy Gelato

After shopping in Gucci, we went to see other shops. Actually, the place was quite small with not many brands. I was expecting the place would be big and there were a lot of branded shops around, it was smaller than the one i went in Japan. So if you are to visit The Mall in Florence, go only if you want to get stuffs from Prada and Gucci. If not, don't bother making the trip there. There were also branded shops around the streets of Florence, you just need to go the correct place. After all the shopping there, we went to the tax refund office located at the bus stop. As we were not going back from Italy, the officer told us that we need to go to 2 train stations (Chiasso & Domodossola) and get the custom stamps for the tax refund forms before we leave Italy and mail them back. Later on, i went back to check, the train frequency for this 2 stations were not so frequent and we were having a late train to take from Venice to Milan on the last day for Italy. Anyway, we went back to the hotel to put our stuffs first and then we headed to have dinner. Before dinner, we headed to a gelato shop instead, called Gelateria Carab. I got myself a plum gelato...ooohhh....it was so damn nice!! My another friend wanted to try something special and new, so she got a granita. The other friend doesn't want to have it at first, till both of us kept telling it was sooooo nice and i let her try one mouth from my gelato. She dashed back in to the shop and got herself 1 cup. I was the last one to finish it, as usual...the 2 of them had finished their first cup and they went back to have a 2nd cup..hahhaa...The shop owner was friendly too and think he was surprised why we kept going back to his shop.....kekeke....this was the last gelato i ate in Italy....If you are going to Florence, don't miss this small gelato shop. Best!

Inside of the Restaurant

After the nice and yummy gelato, we walked to our dinner place, named Ristorante Paoli. It definitely looked classy, and the interior was very beautiful. Too bad, it was fully booked when we reached there but we still had a bit of luck. We were allowed to take the table outside, so we went with it (cos i think there was one family after us wanted to take the outside table too, if we didn't sit in first). Then we ordered the food and had a nice dinner there. The tomato soup is quite thick and really tasted with tomato (not like those mixed with water and with no taste). The whole dinner costs us euro $60. After the dinner, we made our way to Piazzale Michelangelo. We walked quite a distance before we made it to a bus stop that we could take a bus up to the place. As we were walking, think i saw Ponte Vecchio afar but not sure...could be...hahaha....Oh well, and so we waited the bus for like half an hour or so before it finally came.....After 6 or 7 stops, we reached the piazzale (along the way, the 3 of us were in sleepy mode on the bus ride...hahhaa).

Overview of Florence City (Night View)

At the piazzale, there was a copy of David statue, smaller version and it looked kind of dirty. But when you turn away from the statue, is a good nice overview of Florence city with all the lights shining. There were 3 buildings that stood out from all other buildings, one confirmed was the Duomo (which was in the center), Palazzo Vecchio (i think it is, which was on the left side), and 1 more building on the right side (which i don't know what it was). After spending some time up there taking photos and looking at the view, we made our way to the bus stop. Gosh, the bus required an hour to come and it was the last bus. So we just sat there, stood there to wait for the bus to come. It came at 12.05 pm, my eyes almost wanted to close. We just napped on the bus when we boarded, after we alighted, we still need to walk a short distance back to the hotel. I never got used to the streets in Italy, as in i can't get familiarize with the roads we walked, from the hotel and back to the hotel. It was kind of confusion walking in Italy...hahahaa...but still we managed to walk back to our hotel safe and sound.

There's really much to see in Florence, too bad we had planned our stay too short here. Target myself to come again next time. ^_^

Note: For the tax refund thingy, if you are not leaving from Italy, then be prepare to give up refunding it. The VAT is 8% for minimum euro $150 in a single receipt and as i mentioned earlier, you will need to travel down to Chiasso or Domodossola (it may be different stations depending on where is your last destination, for mi, my last destination was Zurich) to get their customs stamp. If you are ok without the refund, then my advice is just forget it unless the train frequency to the particular station is very often (like every 1 hour), then you can go ahead with it. If not, don't bother about it. It may waste your 1 day just by doing this, so why waste it? Enjoy your holidays!

Hotel Stayed:
Hotel Europa

Places Visited:
Galleria dell'Accademia
Florence Cathedral
The Mall
Piazzle Michalengo

Europe 2nd Trip - Rome, Italy (Day 4)

28th Oct 2013, Monday, Sunny

Today is the last day in Naples and we are going back to Rome for a 3 days' stay. We woke up at around 6 plus and got ready for the day. We packed our luggage and went upstairs for our breakfast (Still love the croissant and the triangular pantry there - it was known as sfogliatelle...... ^_^....nice nice). After the wonderful breakfast, we made our way back to our room and collected our luggage, later went down to do the check-out. Then we got the hotel staff to help us get us a cab to drive us down to the train station. After 5 to 10 mins, the cab arrived and we said goodbye to the hotel staff (who were all very helpful and pleasant during our stay).

Our Queue Number

When we arrived at the train station, we went to the tickets reservation office to make our train reservation. It was a group of people waiting in the queue too..luckily it wasn't as crowded as in Rome. But we were targeting for the next coming train, so i was left to wait in the office and my friends went to the platform with our luggage first (so once i am done with the reservations, we can just board the train). After a 10 mins wait, i finally got my turn and got the reservations done. I rushed out the platform and caught with my friends and we boarded the train. It was a 1 hour plus ride to Rome. So we just rested on the train while the train left Naples to Rome. We reached Rome train station at 11 plus (we wanted to deposit our luggage at the train station first, but the queue was super long) and then we got on a cab to head down to the hotel (it was like 5 mins ride from the station to hotel). The hotel name is Target Inn and the lift is inside a cage, where you need to open the cage and then go into the lift and the door is with spring, which it will spring back at you. Anyway, the lift is not big too, and so we need to go up separately due to our luggage. Then we deposited our luggage at the hotel as it was still early for check in. After that, we made our way down to see the catacombs. We had to take the metro down and then changed to the bus...oh god, the metro and the bus really took a long time to come. We took the bus to go along the Appian way, and the road was still with rocks and the road was quite small, there wasn't any road for pedestrians to walk with the cars zooming by.

San Sebastiano Catacombs

Finally, we reached the place to see the catacombs, which is along Appian Way. There were 2 catacombs places there, the one we wanted to go is not opened yet, so we went to the smaller one - San Sebastiano Catacombs. We made it for the English guided tour, so we went down to see. It was quite small and dark, and saw some coffins spaces and graves inside. The guide was speaking too fast and the accent was a bit hard to understand..but can still make out some of the things she was explaining. Then she showed us the grave of Sebastian which was later moved away to St. Peter's Basilica. Later we were also shown that there were 3 rooms that were dug further deep in, these can be used for generations to generations if the area were bought. Then she explained on the vases used as urn and the paintings on the ground and the walls. Then she showed us the dinning place inside and told us that the church which was built by Constantine on top of the catacombs. After this, the whole tour is done, which lasted us like 15 to 20 mins inside. The tour ended in the basilica where we were allowed to take photos around, but there was going to be a funeral going on soon, so we were allowed like 5 mins or so walking around. After this, we went to the souvenir shop where we got some postcards and stamps to send back home.

Twin Churches of Rome

After this, we rested for awhile on a bench outside...stupid shoulders aching.....Then we took the bus down to the other catacombs (which is bigger) - Catacombs of San Callisto. When we reached there, the English guided tour is about to start. One of my friend went ahead and bought her ticket first, the other friend doesn't want to go in so i stayed outside with her while we waited for the friend who went in. While waiting, we walked around the catacombs, there was a path towards some private houses. So we just strolled along that road and enjoyed the breeze and blue sky and white clouds...saw some geese at one of the houses too, i went up to try to take some photos of them while my friend was busy texting on her phone...hohoho...We had some chocolate too while waiting, we waited at least half an hour or more, then my friend appeared again. After the wait, we made our way back to the metro station, where we saw the ruins building on Palatine Hill. After that, we took the metro to the start for Doice Vita Stroll and Heart of Rome Walk. But the starting point for Heart of Rome walk was further, so we went ahead with Doice Vita Stroll. When we came out of the metro station, it was just a normal street and when we turned behind a shop, we saw the Piazza del Popolo, it was so grand...really made you 'wow' there....it was so spectacular! There was an Egyptian obelisk standing in the center of the Piazza, and it was brought over from Egypt. And nearby the obelisk, was a fountain with some lion-like statues. But some kids were just sitting on the statues and riding them around. On the far end of both sides of the Piazza, were Fontana del Nettuno and another statue (not sure what is is....). And you can see the twin churches (Santa Maria dei Miracoli and Santa Maria di Montesanto) standing in front of the Piazza.

Crucifixion of St. Peter (Taken from web)

At the side before we made our way to the Piazza, there stood the church of Santa Maria Del Popolo. It was quite a big church and there were a lot of beautiful paintings inside, and there were 2 great paintings (by an Italian painter - Caravaggio) hidden inside the church, which required to insert coin just to on the light to see them and no photo-taking is allowed. The 2 masterpieces were Crucifixion of St. Peter & Conversion of Saul (St. Paul). We stayed inside for a while, then there was a guy who inserted the coin to light up the 2 masterpieces chamber. Once the coin was inserted, everyone just rushed into the chamber to see the 2 masterpieces. It was super cool...the paintings were so real (almost can see the image popping out)....After the amazing viewing of the 2 grand masterpieces, we headed out to walk over the the Piazza and onto the streets of Rome. There were a lot of shops for shopping and the buses which were going around the streets were small type and it looked cute..hahhaa.....There was even a Ferrari shop around there....(saw a Ferrari F1 car in italy...kekeke).....After some shopping around, we were hungry and then we decided to go down to a 200 years old restaurant - L'Enoteca Antica di Via della Croce.

Tiramisu

The place has a nice ambiance and there was paintings on the walls too. We ordered a lamb shank, spaghetti, cheese platter, cod fish dish and tiramisu as the dessert. The food was nice, i like the lamb shank, the fried potato (as the side) and the cod fish. Most of all, i love the tiramisu!! We ordered their creme brulee at first but they run out of it. So we ordered tiramisu instead, and it was a good choice. I almost wanted to lick the whole plate but cannot...hehehe....but i was using my spoon to lick the remaining.... :P.....It was soooooo nice!!! I had a happy dinner there...hahahaa....and it costs us euro $75 (including the tax and tip). After dinner, we went to the opposite shop which was selling chocolates and gelato. There was a table showing their beautiful packages too, and one of our friend was already snapping her camera away on their food. Mi and my other friend felt kind of bad if we don't buy something from them and the staff was already asking us what do we want to get. So we went ahead and got a small cone of peppermint ice cream. It wasn't so good as expected and it costs euro $2.50 for a single scoop, it was just ok. After this, we continued our way down to the Victor Emmanuel Monument. It was a short walk down the streets, when we reached, we were standing on the opposite of the street, looking at the monument. And in the center, it was a big roundabout for the cars....But it was quite dark when we arrived and i can't see the statues on top of the Emmanuel. It also holds the tomb of the unknown soldier, who was chosen from the among 11 unknown remains from WWI war.

Roman Ancient Forum (Night View)

After the viewing of the Emmanuel, we made our way down to continue the walk.We walked past to a church which doesn't look so grand from the outside (Santa Maria in Aracoeli) with a very high stairs, besides it, was the stairs up to Capitoline Hill. By the time we walked until here, we were all tired from the walking and we still had to climb the stairs up..hohoho.....There were 2 great big statues standing on top of the both sides of the stairs...and opposite the Capitoline hill is the Theatre of Marcellus (which we later knew about during our segway tour) and it was the first amphitheater built before the Colosseum. Anyway, we climbed up the stairs to the Piazza del Campidoglio. My friends took a break on top of the stairs while i went in to explore around. Inside there, stood the statue of the emperor Marcus Aurelius and the statue of She-wolf with the twin brothers, Romulus and Remus (which both were explained by our segway guide too). We were unable to find the grand staircase, which was mentioned in Rick Steve's book. After a short stay there, we made our way down to the bus stop, but the bus we wanted doesn't come and while waiting, we saw 2 tour groups coming and went up to Capitoline Hill too and they seem like doesn't come back down. One of my friend doesn't want to give up looking for the grand staircase, so we went up again. This time, we walked further into the square and at the right side of the Piazza, there was a road downhill (it just looks like a normal road that is going downhill, who will expect at side of the road.....) it would turned out to be the view of the Roman Ancient Forum. It was lighted with few lights, but it was beautiful in the night too (although i will prefer to take the photos of it during the daytime).....

After taking some photos there, we made our way back to the bus stop and stood there and waited for at least an hour for the bus back to hotel. We were so happy the bus came, and were able to go back to the hotel to rest after a long day of walking (we were in need of water this day too....all run out of water...hahhaa).

Hotel Stayed:
Target Inn

Places Visited:
San Sebastiano Catacombs
Catacombs of San Callisto
Piazza del Popolo
Church of Santa Maria Del Popolo
Victor Emmanuel Monument
Capitoline Hill
Roman Ancient Forum