florence, you have my heart.

As Im laying in bed, studying for my Italian test, and wishing I had a water right now, all I can think about is how much fun Florence was!

Before leaving for Florence on Friday, my Thursday night was spent at my favorite neighborhood restaurant Pizzeria San Marcos. I had the most amazing pasta with tomatoes and mozzarella and the most amazing house wine, which was also very cheap :) Natalie, Bri, and I got a little tipsy and went back to the apartment. Just our luck, there was no internet for pretty much the entire night, so we spent some of the night making silly videos on my photo booth.

We woke up at 730 to get ready and leave for the train station to Firenze (Florence in Italian). The train ride was exceptionally fast and was enjoyable because of the pretty scenery. We arrived in Florence just to have enough time to shop around before our walking tour. Immediately, I noticed how more beautiful and cleaner Florence was than Rome. A big difference. We ate lunch at a very cute cafe on the street where Meghan and I split delicious caprese pizza and four cheese gnocchi. We shopped around and noticed our hotel was literally in the center of Florence near the famous Duomo and near all of the greatest stores. We found a wonderful wine shop where I picked a few surprises for my family and Ray. The store owner was such a great person, because he sold me the best wine and I knew it was real, because the wine was not overpriced at all. After checking into our hotel, we had our walking tour, where we saw the Duomo, the river, the hills, and had the best gelato of our lives. Since we woke up so early that morning, we took a huge nap and then woke up just in time for us to head out to dinner. We heard Dante's was a great place to eat for students, because dinner included a liter of free wine, can you say too perfect?? Well, since we were so hungry we decided not to wait for the group and we told them we would meet them there...sure enough we get to "Dantes" and realize it is a totally different Dantes and that there are about 20 in Florence. When in Florence right??? So we eat there and luckily dinner was absolutely phenomenal. We got two huge liters of house white wine and the best lasagna and best tiramisu I have ever had in my entire life.

After leaving the restaurant, we decided to go to the Fish Pub, which we were notified of us as a place to get shots for 1 euro each! We hung out there for awhile and left to go to the next pub where we ran into our entire study abroad group and the LMU Tuscany one as well. Florence is amazing to me for this reason, because it is small enough and very cozy. We all headed out to a disco, which is the European version of an LA nightclub, called Twenty One. It was such a fun night and so worth the pain of waking up at 730 for yet another boring tour. The next morning we visited the Uffizi gallery, which had a lot of famous artwork by artists such as Michelangelo and Raphael. After the museum, we went straight home to take another nap, which lasted much longer than we hoped for. Fortunately, we woke up with just enough hours to go shopping!!! All I can say is that H&M is so much greater than the American version and European shopping kills American. That night consisted of a program dinner and heading out to a very hip and beautiful wine bar called Slowley. The bartender was exceptionally talented when it came to making gorgeous drinks with flowers, fruit, and deliciousness. We went back to another pub and another disco with one of the most fun groups yet! After the club we were on a mission to find some really good pizza, which is a very hard task at 2AM compared to California. We finally found the BEST pizzeria and left to go the hotel.

The next morning we got up early, checked out of our hotel, and went to the museum where the Statue of David was. Now I can really say that this was the most interesting and fascinating piece of artwork I have ever seen. It may seem not too incredible to sculpt a statue of a man, because so many artists have done it, but this statue seen in person will blow anyone's mind away. It is ginormous and just the process in sculpting David fascinated me. After the museum, Jelly, Kelly, Kristine, Hannah, and I climbed the 414 stairs to the top of Duomo bell tower and saw the most beautiful view of Florence. I can honestly say that Florence is my favorite city in Italy, but there is still Venice to see, but for now definitely Florence :)

Today, I booked Paris!!!!!