Ciao Firenze!

I’m writing this post on the train back to Rome after an extremely busy but amazing few days in Florence. Having been in Rome for just over a week it was really interesting for our students to explore a new city, in the very touristic region of Tuscany! 

Tuscany, or in Italian, Toscana, is famous for being the birthplace of many of the artistic and scientific greats of the past, including Galileo, Michelangelo, Dante and Raphael. 

We were lucky enough to visit the Galileo Museum and see many of the astrological and astronomical instruments used by the man himself including astrolabes, barometers and thermometers which partly thanks to the discoveries of Galileo around 400 years ago, have led us to the understanding of science that we have today.

We also saw many fun optical illusions of physics and electricity, and one of the strangest things might have been the relic of his skeletal middle finger, removed from his body almost 100 years after his death, which is now encased in a glass canister in one of the rooms of the museum.

We also got up close and personal with Michelangelo’s famous David and couldn’t believe our eyes - he’s so much bigger in real life!! The Galleria dell’Accademia also played host to a fun photo challenge where our students recreated the poses of the art on display and found portraits which represented events of the trip so far. 

Another highlight was the cooking class at Baldovino, where we got to eat our culinary creations, but this delicious night needs a blog post of its own! 

Finally, we couldn’t leave Florence without doing some shopping, and we enjoyed wandering along Ponte Vecchio with its jewellery stalls and taking in the live music while watching the sunset. In fact, once the sun went down and the daytime heat lifted, we enjoyed a passeggiata, a walk around the main piazzas and some of us even took a ride on the carousel while listening to a busker before getting a gelato to round off the night. 

Since Florence is well known for its leather market we all had a go at haggling with the vendors and trying to get a good bargain - so families, you can look forward to some Florentine souvenirs coming your way very soon!