Florence

We packed up the car Sat morning with clothes, food, juice, a cooler, stroller, backpack kid-carrier, a few of Mo's favorite books and toys, sun umbrella, sand toys and were off!! We rolled out of Naples around 9:30 AM and got into our hotel around 1:30 PM. We had picked the cheapest hotel with free parking in Florence we could find off booking.com and the 3 star Alex Hotel turned out to be pretty good. Free breakfast, a 10-15 minute tram ride to the city center which can be caught right in front of the hotel, and AC - all for 55 EU!

We walked around Florence that afternoon and evening, and again the next day after breakfast. Boy is it hot in summer - about 90-95F!!! I don't get why all the tourists visit Italy in the summer - it's brutal. We saw all the main sights - didn't actually go into much, but walked by everything - the Academia, the Uffizi, the main church, Ponte Vecchia bridge. Living in Italy for this past year we are a little art-beautiful churches and museum-ed-out that if it costs money right now we'd pass and prefer to people watch at a cafe outside.

We were happy to find Jeff's "man-bag" finally - an all leather, inside and outside, small messenger bag. It's really neat and fun to have a souvenir from the trip.