055 23 02 185 www.roominflorence.com
Down the block from the train station, the two levels of Hotel Ester boast an array of private rooms with flatscreen TVs, mini-fridges, and overhead fans. The longer the hike, the better the view—the third story rooms boast a lovely prospect, while the larger rooms across the street at sister hotel Luna Rossa are a good deal for groups (quad €120).
From train station, turn left at the McDonald’s; Hotel Ester is about 1 block down on the right. Luna Rossa and Maison de Charme are across the street and adjacent, respectively, but share Hotel Ester’s reception. Mar-Oct doubles €75, with bath €90; Nov-Feb €55/60.
DAVID INN
V. Ricasoli 31
HOSTEL
055 21 37 07 hostelfirenze.splinder.com
One of the few small hostels in Florence, David Inn sits on the top floor of an otherwise residential building, and is the sort of place that provides you with somewhere to sleep—and not much else. No common space except for a couple squashy couches against an orange wall. The dorms are your basic bunk-bed situation, and the kitchen is tiny. But the small hostel scene in town is fairly dire, so if Academy is full or too posh for your hosteling tastes, then try here.
About a 5min. walk north of the Duomo, on the right. Luggage storage. Dorms €24-26. Reception 24hr.
The Oltrarno
This side of the river has a decent concentration of good hostels, but they aren’t significantly cheaper than the more centrally located places. You have to really want to be in the Oltrarno to stay here.
OSPITALE DELLE RIFIORENZE
P. Piattellina 1
HOSTEL
055 21 67 98 www.firenzeospitale.it
Carved out of an old monastery, this socially aware hostel still feels like a religious escape. Live like a monk in a little pre-fab cell for two or three and hang out in the cavernous common space, featuring an ornate but decaying 15th-century ceiling that looks like something off the Titanic. All kinds of classes are run here including yoga, capoeira, and ceramics. Some of them are free, others are free for your first session. The folks at this nonprofit, co-operative hostel are a special sort—take one of their booklets providing walking tours of the people’s Florence, which shift the historical perspective from the Medici to the Medici’s handmaids.
From P. Santo Spirito, the “ostello” signs direct you to this one. Free Wi-Fi. 3- to 4-bed dorms €15; doubles €40; triples €45. Reception 7am-noon and 3pm-2am. Curfew 2am.
HOSTEL SANTA MONACA
V. Santa Monaca 6
HOSTEL
055 26 83 38 www.ostello.it
This former monastery has all the charm of a local community center, despite the occasional cast-iron gate or vaulted ceiling. Rooms are simple, bathrooms are shared, and everything is kept clean during a strict 10am-2pm lockout. A nice large mess hall lined with picnic tables and a digital projector for sporting events are the few perks. A small grocery store is next door, but the ”kitchen” is poorly equipped and overcrowded at meal times. You’ll reap the benefits of Santa Monaca’s proximity to the P. di Santo Spirito after-dinner scene—as long as you’re back for the 2am curfew.
For details on Florence map, click here
From P. Santo Spirito, take a right onto V. Sant’Agostino and then a left onto V. Santa Monaca. Free Wi-Fi. Dorms €17.50-20.50. Reception 7am-2am. Curfew 2am. Lockout 10am-2pm.
PLUS CAMPING MICHELANGELO
Vle. Michelangelo 80
CAMPING
055 68 11 977 www.camping.it
Camping sure sounds nice, doesn’t it? A bit of the great outdoors, some greenery, roughing it a little? Don’t be fooled. Whether you’re packing a tent or renting a bungalow, this campsite has all the appeal of the neighboring Piazzale Michelangelo—which is to say, of a parking lot. The bungalows sleep two or three in bunk beds. You have to share a key, and there’s no locker in the tent, so we don’t recommend going halvsies on one with a stranger. Bathrooms are in a facility at the top of the hill akin to the locker room at a large gym. Wi-Fi is expensive and limited. The cafe is your only option for food that doesn’t require a good walk, though at least the view is nice from its seating area.
To the left of Piazzale Michelangelo, or take the #12 bus to the Camping stop. 2-bed tents €29; 3-bed €36. Reception 24hr.
SOGGIORNO PITTI
P. Pitti 8
HOSTEL, HOTEL
329 06 40 765 www.soggiornopitti.com
This is a sort of a hotel-hostel combo—the feel is hostel, with a big comfy common space, but most of the rooms are private, with double beds and twins. The bathrooms are clean but not terribly plentiful. That being said, it is a serviceable hostel and benefits from the best location of the three in the western Oltrarno. But if you look elsewhere in Florence you’ll find nicer options than this.
Across the street from Palazzo Pitti. Dorms €20; doubles with bath €70; quads €92. Reception 8am-11pm.
SIGHTS
Hope you like the Renaissance! Seriously, that’s the big game in town here. If you search really hard you can find museums or attractions that don’t have their roots in the 16th century, but there aren’t many. If you do like the Renaissance, this is literally the best place in the world for you. Options abound, so it’s best to take your time and appreciate things rather than letting them become a devalued mush of crucifixes and portraits of semi-attractive women.
Duomo And Piazza Della Signoria
UFFIZI GALLERY
Piazzale degli Uffizi 6
MUSEUM
055 23 88 651 www.firenzemusei.it
Welcome to the Uffizi. The first thing you should know about this museum is that the David is not here—he’s on the other side of town, in the Accademia. Also, the Mona Lisa is in France, and de Nile ain’t just a river in Egypt.
If you’re looking for an art history lesson, don’t expect to find one in this listing. You won’t find one in the galleries’ texts either: although the explanatory panels are in both Italian and English, they are not hugely informative. Your best bet is to take an audio tour (€5.50) or to stick with Let’s Go. We’ll do our best to point out some of the main things you might not notice on your own.
The Uffizi’s rooms are numbered. Look to the lintel of the doorway to figure out what room you’re in. Our instructions will assume that you are going through the galleries sequentially.
Start the Uffizi from the top. Don’t crumple up your ticket at the bottom of your bag (or paste it directly into your notebook like we did) because, after climbing two flights of the Uffizi’s grand staircase, you’ll be asked to flash your ticket once more. At this point, you’re standing in an enormous hallway lined with statues and frescoed to within an inch of its life.
The first room you’ll actually enter is Room 2, which begins the long parade of Jesuses that you’ll be visiting today. Rooms 3-4 are particularly gilded. In Martini’s Annunciation, Gabriel literally spits some Latin at Mary, who responds with the mother of all icy stares. In Room 6, take some time with Beato Angelico’s fun Scenes From the Lives of Hermits.
The next few rooms are all well and good, but Rooms 10-14 are the main event. Where there be crowds and benches, there be the postcard works. Not that you need us to tell you this, but Botticelli’s Birth of Venus is on the left—that’s right, behind all those people. Push your way to the front to enjoy all the little details that don’t come across in the coffee mug and mousepad reproductions, like the gold trim on the trees, the detail of the fabrics, and Venus’s rather poor haircut. It’s like she tried to get the Rachel but left on an extra 4ft.
Room 15 features works by a fellow named Leonardo da Vinci. If you’re able to tell which are by him without reading the plaques, give yourself a pat on the back for being a good art historian.
If you’re getting sick of Catholicism, skedaddle to Room 20 to view a couple rare portraits of Martin Luther. Ninety-five theses, three chins. Room 22 has a Mantegna triptych on the right with a curved center panel that makes it s
eem almost 3D. Room 25 varies the Jesus-ness with some scenes from Joseph’s story in Exodus on the right. There’s a seriously ginormous baby in Room 29’s Parmigianino painting, which is called Madonna of the Long Neck for reasons that will be obvious.
A really interestingly composed painting of a woman bathing hangs on the near-right wall of Room 31. What do you look at first? Don’t be shy, we know you’re eyeing her luscious breasts. And then you probably look at her legs and thighs, and perhaps the rest of her. And then, if you haven’t yet turned away, maybe you will notice King David in the top left corner. The woman is Bathsheba, and Brusasorci’s painting is remarkable for making you, the viewer, mimic the intensity of David’s ogling gaze.
On the left in Room 35 is a Massacre of the Innocents by Daniele Ricciarelli. Though feminists might be excited about the painter’s vaguely female name, sadly, Daniele was a dude like every other artist in the Uffizi. Despite the pile of dead babies in this painting, Let’s Go does not condone the making of dead baby jokes.
Finally you’ll reach the Room of Niobe, an impressive palatial space full of statues posed as if frozen while cowering in horror, not unlike the poses of the ash corpses in Pompeii. These statues were discovered in the Villa Medici gardens and are supposed to be the unfortunate children of Niobe about to be slain by the gods as revenge for their mother’s pride in her progeny.
The last couple of rooms have some 18th-century stuff. But you don’t care about that. You waited in line for 3hr. and then proceeded through an endless line of rooms filled with Renaissance art, so maybe it’s time to just go home. Congratulations on finishing the Uffizi; now you can go act like a Botticelli expert among all your friends, even if the only thing you remember is Venus’s terrible haircut.
It’s the long narrow part of P. della Signoria. Enter (or stand in line) on the left, reserve tickets on the right. To avoid the lines without paying for a reservation, try arriving late in the day, when your time in the museum will be limited by closing. 2-3hr. wait in line is average. €10, EU citizens ages 18-25 €5, EU citizens under 18 and over 65 and the disabled free. €4 reservation fee. Audio tour €5.50. Open Tu-Su 8:50am-6:50pm.
THE BARGELLO
V. del Proconsolo 4
MUSEUM
055 23 88 606 www.firenzemusei.it
For a change of pace, the Bargello offers a nice dose of 19th-century eclecticism: it’s a bit like London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, with objects organized by function and material. The building was once a brutal prison, but fortunately for visitors, there’s no trace of this original purpose left in the architecture. The courtyard, once the site of public executions, is now adorned with terra-cotta coats of arms and family crests. Several statues remain from what must have been an extremely suggestive fountain. Look for the water spigots located in such charming locations as between a lady’s legs. There’s also an enormous cast cannon bearing the head of St. Paul, a devoted disciple of the prince of peace who probably wouldn’t be too happy about having his face emblazoned on heavy artillery. Pass the pair of great stone lions wearing iron crowns—very Narnia—to find a hall full of pagan (not so Narnia) sculptures such as Adonis, Bacchus, and a 1565 work celebrating Florence’s victory over Pisa.
The courtyard stairs bring you to some stone fowl and a series of numbered galleries. Minutely carved ivories, from tiny portraits to hair combs to a giant chess board are in Room 4. The variety of objects that people have thought to carve from elephant tusk is astounding.
Room 6 holds a huge collection of Maiolica, an earthenware pottery that is decorated before being glazed. Room 8 will introduce you to the Ninja Turtle you know least well. This Salone Di Donatello was designed for his 500th birthday in 1887, and has remained unchanged since.
Room 9 contains probably the only Arabic script you’ll see in Tuscany. This chamber is devoted to Islamic art and has some very interesting ceramics and fabrics.
Room 10 is a true Victorian wunderkammer (or wonder-cabinet). There’s the case of pipes, the case of bottles, and the collection of keys and locks. There are even table settings, scientific instruments, metalwork, jewelry, and that 17th-century spork you’ve been missing.
On the third floor, check out the fantastic tiny bronzes in Room 15. Room 13’s glazed terra cotta in blues, greens, and yellows creates a color scheme that will make you feel as if you’ve been sucked into a game of old-school Oregon Trail. Behind the Palazzo Vecchio. €4, EU citizens ages 18-25 €2, EU citizens under 18 and over 65 free. Open daily 8:15am-5pm. Closed 1st, 3rd, and 5th Su each month, and 2nd and 4th M.
DUOMO
P. del Duomo 1
CHURCH
055 23 02 885 www.operaduomo.firenze.it
Honestly, it’s better on the outside. The Duomo complex is enormous and distinctive, looming over every other Florentine building. All roads seem to lead to the Duomo and its shockingly colorful facade, capped with that giant red gelato-cone of a dome. It’s famous, it’s old, and it’s free: clearly it must be the greatest tourist attraction known to humanity.
Well, it’s all right. There are a lot of really great churches in Florence, and the Duomo just happens to be the biggest. It truly is enormous, but once you’ve stood in line behind half a dozen cruise-ship excursion groups to file your way inside the mighty cathedral, you might find yourself wondering—”is that all there is?”
Fortunately, it’s not. Unfortunately, all the good parts have been divvied up, so you can only sample a bit at a time. All the statues, paintings, and other adornments—including a pietà that Michelangelo originally intended for his own tomb and the incredibly creepy Mary of the Glass Eyes—have been moved into the Museo Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore across the street. The octagonal building by the entrance to the cathedral is the Baptistery, where you also have to pay for entrance, although you can admire Ghiberti’s splendid golden eastern doors —dubbed the “Gates of Paradise” by Michelangelo—for free. The final attractions are the dome and the campanile, both of which involve 400+ steps of climbing (unless you’re training for some kind of stair-climing race, there’s really no reason to do both). For free, all you get is a rather empty, cavernous church.
In the church, there are certainly highlights. The inside of Filippo Brunelleschi’s vast dome is ornately frescoed and extremely impressive, even from ground level. On the opposite side of the nave a 24hr. clock by Paolo Uccello oxymoronically runs counter-clockwise. If you take the stairs in the middle of the church’s floor down to the basement, you can pay €3 to see the archaeological remnants of the Duomo’s previous incarnations, which is cool if you like that sort of thing.
And in a bit of irony, that notable green-white-and-pink marble facade that’s so impressive from the outside—well, it’s a fake. Or rather, it’s not contemporary to the cathedral itself. The Duomo’s facade was left unfinished in the 16th century and was eventually removed completely, leaving the great cathedral buck naked. Only in the late 19th century—last Thursday by Florentine standards—did the Duomo receive its famous decoration. Like much of Florence, it’s not actually from the Renaissance—it’s the Victorian equivalent of a Renaissance Faire.
Still really pretty, though.
Come on, you can’t miss it. Audio tour available in English. Duomo free. Dome €8. Campanile €6. Museum €6. Baptistery €4. Duomo open M-F 10am-5pm, Sa 10am-4:45pm, Su 1:30-3:30pm. 1st Sa each month only open 10am-3:30pm. Dome open M-F 8:30am-7pm, Sa 8:30am-5:40pm. Campanile open daily 8:30am-7:30pm. Museum open M-Sa 9am-7:30pm, Su 9am-1:40pm. Baptistery open in summer M-W 12:15-6:30pm, Th-Sa 12:15-10:30pm, Su 8:30am-1:30pm; in winter M-Sa 12:15-6:30pm, Su 8:30am-1:30pm. In both seasons open 1st Sa of the month 8:30am-1:30pm.
PIAZZA DELLA SIGNORIA
P. della Signoria
PIAZZA
Don’t be fooled by the David in front of the Palazzo Vecchio—the real deal is in the Accademia. The reproduction in the piazza fills David’s original location and stands just as proud as his original did when he (alleg
edly) was installed facing Pisa to celebrate Florence’s dominance over the Tuscan region. To the left of the statue is a giant fountain which Michelangelo despised so much that he called it a waste of perfectly good marble. To the big guy’s right you’ll find the Loggia, a portico full of statues that’s as legit as any room in the Uffizi. Hang out amid the art students sketching, listen to the street musicians, and enjoy the free outdoor art. Don’t miss Giambologna’s spiraling Rape of the Sabines.
This is the main piazza to the north of the Uffizi. Free.
PONTE VECCHIO
Ponte Vecchio
BRIDGE
This is Florence’s famous shop-covered bridge. It has been called the “old” bridge for, oh, 400 years or so, ever since the Florentines first built a second bridge over the Arno and had to find a way to distinguish this one from their new ponte. When the Nazis evacuated Florence, Ponte Vecchio was the only bridge they didn’t destroy. Now it is full of gold and jewelry shops—more like kiosks, in many cases—as well as shadier street vendors and buskers. Come on a weekend afternoon, and you are guaranteed to be in the wedding photos of at least half a dozen bridal parties. Come at night for a romantic view of the river—and of other couples seeking the same.
Let's Go Europe 2011: The Student Travel Guide Page 151