From Venice to Florence

We did not have access to the internet yesterday so we are now catching up!



So here is the train that we took to Florence, not
the old nostalgic train that I was expecting but a high speed, first class 2 hour ride - funny thing,
though - there was nowhere to put any luggage!
Nice ride though and the train station was very
close to our hotel in Florence so that was nice.







This is Piazza Santa Maria Novella, same name
as our hotel. (which is actually on the square)
There are many very old buildings in the area; you can walk anywhere and find something interesting at every corner. There are many open markets and more (former & present)churches than anywhere we've seen, including Ireland - but we haven't been to Rome yet!








The Duomo Santa Maria del Fiore is in the
background, and the round building in front is the Baptistery. Our tour guide informed us that at one time, everone in the area was baptised here,
including herself.












Inside is beautiful, they have these 'tree of lights', we both lit candles for our Moms.
Below floor level an archaeological dig is underway and revealing a previous church (wow! another church!).