Day 6: First Day in Florence

Today was our first day in Florence! We hopped on a train to get there. My first impression of it was that it was a lot more tourist-y than Milan was. It was really crowded and there was always someone trying to sell you something. Walking to our hotel was miserable, because it was down pouring. I swear, the rain follows us whenever we go outside, because when we were on the train, there was no rain. As soon as we got off the train, it started to rain. And once we were inside our hotel, the rain stopped.

Anyways, we dropped off our luggage in our rooms then headed out for a walking tour of the city. It was raining the whole time, so our tour guide made out so we were inside for most of the tour. Our first stop was Florence's Duomo, where we could only walk in specially roped areas to preserve the marble in the middle of the building. The dome was the most beautiful part of the building, because it was completely covered in paintings like the Sistine Chapel, known as a fresco. There were scenes of angels, saints, and Jesus Christ. The walls were covered in beautiful frescos of saints as well.

After the Duomo, our tour guide took us to the Florentine Leather School, which I think is one of the coolest places we've been so far. We got to watch artisans and students cut and style different types of leather into bags, wallets, belts, etc. The types of leather used included cow, deer, ostrich, lamb, crocodile, and python. But the coolest part was watching one of the artisans, Francesco, put gold designs on leather by engraving them with heat stamps. He put a very thin, delicate piece of 22 carat gold foil on a leather coaster, then imprinted designs on it with stamps that were heated by fire. When he removed the excess gold, the design remained and it looked amazing. After our tour of the leather school finished, we all excitedly went to the gift shop to get leather goods to take home, which Francesco engraved for free. I got presents for my family members here. Then we got dinner at a small restaurant, where I had gnocchi (my third time having it, because it's so good).

After dinner, a group of us went out to explore the night life in Florence. We went to a karaoke bar where we totally rocked, and by "rocked" I mean "completely butchered," Thrift Shop. Then, after we left the club, the unthinkable happened: one of us got their pone pickpocketed. Said person realized it right away and we tried to get it back for a few minutes, but we soon realized that it would be a fruitless effort and we decided to walk away. We all got back to the hotel safely but we were all shook up. It's funny, you never think that something will happen to you but then it does and you can't believe it. I'm definitely holding my purse a little tighter from now on.