Florence Day Two

The second day we went to see the Academia, which I also bought a guide for.  It was really cool.  There were some weird paintings.  Like this one of Jesus and Mary looking like emaciated wraith/zombies.  Weird.  And it's by a famous guy, too.  Lippi or Perugino.  Anyway it was weird. 

 This is a really famous sculpture, the Rape of the Sabine Women.  It was beautiful in a disturbing way.  They really captured the horror in the woman.

 This is the hall where the David is.  It also houses the "slaves" a commissioned project by Michaelangelo, but that wasn't finished, so they're in various stages of completion and you can see how they're being carved from the stone.  It was really fascinating.

 Coolest of all was the David.  It was beautiful, stunning, amazing.  I can't describe it, the feeling, not really.  It's vast.  So much larger than I thought, and I'd seen lots of photos.  It's three or four times taller than a man.  The detail is ... indescribable.  I tried to take photos and I can remember how I felt when I see them, but words fail me.  It was beautifully housed and you are just utterly able to see it and experience it, in spite of the crowds, which isn't possible with paintings.  It was ... so cool.  Coolest five minutes of the trip, maybe.

 Look how cool it is that the slaves are crawling out of the stone.

 Yes, that's me in front of the David.  WOW.

 I liked this one where Mary is holding down a rope to help people get up to heaven.  Of course, they're a bit confused.  That's really Jesus' job, but still.

 They had a strativarius! Two actually, but pretty cool, huh?

Florence

Here we are in Florence!  We had a good drive from Rome to Florence.  It is a beautiful city!  We found our hotel, really nice, and then took off to walk around.  We got tickets for the Uffizi that afternoon and the Academia the next day.  We also went to see the Duomo on both days!  

There were lots of great shops, including some beautiful leather shops!  I started drooling over the Italian leather purses and jackets... 

 Almost to the Duomo!

 Here it is, noisy facade and all.  It's pretty cool that they built the Duomo before they had the knowledge of how to MAKE a dome.  They left the top just an empty hole until they could figure out how to enclose it.

 Here we are inside.

 The dome was the architectural feat, but I swear the regular beams and main area was the most beautiful to me.

 The dome.

 The section with these doors was actually being refurbished or something, but aren't they pretty!? Talk about lavish!

 Here we are outside the Uffizi.  I got a guidebook and read up on the stuff inside so I'd be ready to be amazed.

 Somewhere there's a shot of me in front of Machiavelli since my senior thesis was on him, but I'm not sure what happened to that photo.

 This little bridge is full of jewelry shops.  Whit said I could get something but the only ring I really wanted was 6,000 pounds... so I figured I'd pass.  LOL.

 Michaelangelo's Holy Family with Infant.

 Here's a shot of the Uffizi from the patio.

 This wasn't famous, but it touched me.  All the depictions of Jesus were strange, but this one reminded me of Jesus I know.  I saw a lot of Botticelli and I saw many other famous paintings, like the Birth of Venus, etc.

 We went up to the steps of the Piazza Michaelangelo after that.  It was really cool.  There was live music, an Italian guy covering the weirdest mix of American songs you've ever heard. We saw three brides.

Istanbul Day 2

On our second day in Istanbul, we went to the Basilica Cistern right next to the Hagia Sofia.  It's really cool down there, and really cool.  There are lots of fish, as you can see.  There are also beautiful lights they put in and some really cool carvings.  

 Pictures were prohibited but, people were just snapping away so I figured I'd take a few shots, too.

 We went to Hagia Sofia next.  The line was long long long and we had to get to the airport, so we paid extra to get some tickets from a Turkish scalper, but I'm glad we did.  It was cool to see.  One of the first Christian churches ever built.  It was built by Constantinople, who's mom had converted to Christianity.

 The stone work was really beautiful.  To make it Islamic, they added big camel skin circles with weird lettering up on the ceilings.

 It was really gorgeous, though.

 That night we made it to Rome.  It was a shorter flight, but we were still pretty tired, so all we did was go to dinner and then walk over to the Vatican.  The boys were pleased that we got to drive right past St. Peter's.

 Dinner was really yummy and we found some amazing gelato, too!

 Here we are at the Vatican.

 It was hard to get any shots, but a few of my attempts came out okay.

Istanbul Day One

I have no idea how we ended up with this photo of the kids before the circus on the same file as the trip we just took, but I thought it was cute, so there it is.  :-) 

 Here we are in Istanbul!  We had a 14 hour flight but Turkish airlines is awesome!  Turkish delight-delicious! Fresh flowers, great little welcome packets with socks, slippers, lip balm, toothbrush and paste, eye covers, pillows, blankets, and on and on.

Here we are, seriously jetlagged and happy to be on dry ground!  Here's Whit and Brian, just in the main square of old town.  I got us a hotel near the airport (Marriott) but I hadn't thought about needing a cab into town and then back and then back in the next day and then back again! Sheesh.  Oh well.  Live and learn.   Anyway, the old town is beautiful!

 Every European civilization seems to have stolen lots of obelisks from Egypt.  Here's one in the main square.

 Here's the famous blue mosque.  I had to wear a head shawl and skirt thing but I didn't get a photo of that.  It's on Whit's phone I think, or Brian's.  Anyway, it was a neat sight.  The guide we had kept telling us how it had 6 minarets.  Apparently they use them to call people to prayer but it's a big deal there.  They have seven in Mecca, but nowhere else.. so they are pretty proud of the minarets. I must have heard the phrase "six minaret" 100 times.  Even the cabbies had to say it when we passed!

So here is the beautiful Blue Mosque!!

 A minaret!!

 There are thousands of wires dropped from the ceiling to hold up all the lights.  It's a little distracting.  You'd think they'd have come up with another, better, less distracting way to light the place!!

 SIX MINARET!

 They had these stars all over the floor.  Pretty cool.

 Then just a walk across the street and you're at the Hagia Sofia. We didn't go inside that night but egads it was gorgeous.

 That night we walked a LOT before grabbing another cab and making it to the pier. Once there we finally found our boat for our fancy dinner cruise.  Here's my hot date.

 Here we are, super duper duper jetlagged but still having fun.  I loved the food.  Lots of spices.  Tons and tons of different kinds of things to try, all heavily spiced.  I have a photo but I think it's on my phone or Whit's of the food.  It was really cool.  3 courses.  the dessert was melons, but they were really good!

 The traditional turkish dancing afterward was... strange.  Look at these men with fabric over their heads and faces on their stomachs.  SO WEIRD.  I had no idea what to make of it.

 The belly dancer had a serious crush on Brian.  She came over and made him get up and dance over and over and never did that with ANYONE else.  Haha.  Good thing Brooke wasn't there.  I'd have punched her in the eye if she tried that crap with Whit.  LOL

 At the end, we all got up and danced a bit.  Whit isn't really into all that, but he finally did.

 I sure love this man!  The only thing I loved more late that night was when we finally got back to our hotel (our cabbie couldn't find it.  I was seriously worried we'd never get back) and we got to sleep.  Hallelujah!!