Day One
After more than 20 hours of traveling by car, tram, and plane; navigating the Detroit International Airport, the Paris Airport, and the Florence Airport; and waiting in the airports, we arrived at our apartments at nearly 5:30 pm local time. (It's a six hour time difference from Detroit).
We had a one hour delay in leaving from Detroit due to an air conditioning issue, a baggage loading cart issue, and them having to recount the bags because of it. And then we had our flight to Italy pushed back because the flight ahead of us was late, then again when our flight staff arrived to the plane late.
The trip to the apartment was full of quick turns and streets full of motorbikes which were full of pedestrians, bikers, and other cars. Our apartment is right near the market and during the day there are a ton of merchandise carts outside in the palazzo.
On our first night, we met up with the male architecture students at the Duomo and went and had pizza and wine. Unlike cities in the U.S. the streets are not labeled with street signs that are visible from a distance. There are streets that are labeled with small signs, but typically we did not find any road signs as they are high plaques on the sides of the buildings and not very visible at night. With the buildings all being tall multi-story buildings with shops and restaurants on the main level and apartments above, there was not a way to really see the landmarks that we were looking for to guide us. It took us a couple of wrong turns to get to the Duomo. The boys took a couple of wrong turns and ended up at the Fiume Arno! They were over half an hour late to dinner because of it.
Here are some photos of us at the airports and on our first night!
We had a one hour delay in leaving from Detroit due to an air conditioning issue, a baggage loading cart issue, and them having to recount the bags because of it. And then we had our flight to Italy pushed back because the flight ahead of us was late, then again when our flight staff arrived to the plane late.
The trip to the apartment was full of quick turns and streets full of motorbikes which were full of pedestrians, bikers, and other cars. Our apartment is right near the market and during the day there are a ton of merchandise carts outside in the palazzo.
On our first night, we met up with the male architecture students at the Duomo and went and had pizza and wine. Unlike cities in the U.S. the streets are not labeled with street signs that are visible from a distance. There are streets that are labeled with small signs, but typically we did not find any road signs as they are high plaques on the sides of the buildings and not very visible at night. With the buildings all being tall multi-story buildings with shops and restaurants on the main level and apartments above, there was not a way to really see the landmarks that we were looking for to guide us. It took us a couple of wrong turns to get to the Duomo. The boys took a couple of wrong turns and ended up at the Fiume Arno! They were over half an hour late to dinner because of it.
Here are some photos of us at the airports and on our first night!