Finally in Florence!

We arrived in Florence during the mid afternoon. It was Bill’s first time driving there, and he was pretty nervous about the prospect of finding parking. Tom, our winery guide, a member of the wine group I formed on Facebook, had advised us to leave our car in a “free” parking lot, not far from the hotel he had booked for us. But, by the time we got to Florence, all of the spaces in the lot were full. When we first arrived, Bill also didn’t know that there was a huge parking garage located nearby. If we had known about the garage sooner, it would have spared Bill about an hour of driving around, looking for a space. Florence is a very busy city!

The GPS sent us down a narrow, one way street that didn’t seem like it should have vehicular traffic. Bill turned left, only to be confronted by a congested side street with cars crammed together. We found our lodging, Hotel Firenze Capitale, which was located on the second floor of a beautiful old building with frescoes on the ceilings of the bedrooms. However, thanks to the many scooters parked in front of the building, unloading our luggage was a very hasty project resulting in indignant horn honking from the vehicles behind Bill. I finally jumped out of the car with several bags and dashed into the building, completely missing the doorbell for the hotel. That was a critical error, but I was so flustered and anxious about successfully moving the bags, I just didn’t see it. I might have noticed it if someone hadn’t left the front door open, which was not a normal thing, as we found out over our three nights there.

Next, I was confronted by the old fashioned elevator. It was very tiny, and the kind of elevator in which one must close the doors manually. I barely fit in the lift with my two big bags and purse. Then, I realized I had to lean over and close the front door, then the two internal doors, and hold my breath as the tiny elevator ascended. Once I got to the second floor, I got myself and my stuff out of the tiny lift. To my left, there were the electric sliding doors comprising the hotel’s entrance point. However, there was no doorbell, and the doors didn’t open automatically. I stood there puzzled for a moment, not knowing what to do.

Remember, I had been preoccupied with getting the bags to the hotel, and I wasn’t given instructions about accessing the lodging. Bill had gotten the instructions from Tom, but he hadn’t mentioned the unusual means of accessing the lodging. Or, if he did, I missed the memo. But yes, I was confused when I reached the hotel. Usually, when I go to hotels, the door is open– and there’s someone there to help with bags or valet parking of some kind. I sent Tom a Facebook message, asking what to do.

An Asian man, who had been cleaning the stairwell, noticed my confusion as I stared at the door, not knowing how to access the hotel. He spoke Italian to me, and I didn’t understand… however, the gist of what he was saying had to be something along the lines of, “Why are you just standing here in the hallway looking clueless with your bags?”

Then, without another word, the guy leaned over and knocked on the door for me. How embarrassing! I should have thought of doing that myself. But, in my defense, I didn’t know what was behind the sliding electric door. I was also flummoxed by the sudden movement, and being confronted with an unorthodox hotel that I didn’t choose. I knew nothing at all about the place, or what was expected of me when I arrived.

Thanks to the kind custodian’s knock, the door opened. I profusely thanked the Asian man who helped me. Then I turned my attention to my host. There stood a man named Giuseppe. I did know from one of Tom’s messages that I was looking for Giuseppe. He greeted me and asked why I hadn’t rung the doorbell. I said I hadn’t known about it. I wasn’t the one who received the information about the hotel. I told him that Bill was looking for parking. Giuseppe told me about the parking garage and advised me to call Bill. But then I realized that, one, I didn’t even have Bill’s phone number, and two, even if I called him, he probably wouldn’t answer while he was driving. I did make a point of getting Bill’s number when we were reunited, about an hour later! He had found the garage on his own.

I gave Giuseppe my passport and, as he took it, he put on a mask. So I put on a mask. That turned out to be the only one or two masked interactions we had, as it seemed that the city of Florence was not quite as strict about masks as the cities we visited in Emilia-Romagna had been. We were assigned room 7, a superior class room, which, as promised, had very beautiful frescoes on the ceiling. Giuseppe gave me a very brief tour of the room, but forgot to give me the WiFi code. Fortunately, I had bought a cellular plan for my iPad, so I didn’t have to sit there in boredom while I waited for Bill to make his way to the hotel.

I turned on the TV, and was shocked to find an episode of the 80s era American show, The A-Team, airing. That was an ongoing theme all week in Italy. Lots of 80s vintage shows that were popular when I was a child were on prime time. It was pretty funny!

Once Bill was settled, we decided to take the fifteen minute walk to the historical center of Firenze… that would be where the city’s huge Duomo is. We didn’t bother to go into the cathedral during our visit, since we went to Florence in 2013, and visited it at that time. Frankly, I am much more impressed by the outside of the cathedral there, which is very striking to me. When we visited in 2013, the inside of the cathedral seemed rather plain. I didn’t want to stand in line to see it, either. So we skipped the church in 2022, but you can see my 2013 photos here.

It was exciting to be back in Firenze/Florence, which is a wonderful city. Because it’s so wonderful, there are many, many visitors there at any given time. This was my third visit to Florence, and I remember it was packed on the other two occasions, too. Tom told us that the beginning of COVID was kind of interesting, as the tourists all funneled out and Florence was quiet and empty. I would have liked to have seen it that way. I mentioned that Parma and Modena were not touristy. Well… Florence definitely makes up for that. I heard so many Americans in Florence! It almost seemed like there were more Americans than Italians!

After we walked around for awhile, we realized it was time for dinner. I was getting cranky because of the crowds. Somehow, we ended up on the wrong street, and an enterprising restaurant hawker noticed the look of irritation on my face, as I slowed down to look at a menu. He said, “You want something to drink?”

“Yes.” I said. “God bless you.”

We sat down at a table just inside the restaurant… and much to my shame, I somehow forgot to get a picture of the name of the place. It wasn’t a particularly special restaurant. The waiters all wore t-shirts with the name on it, and I looked it up on Google and noticed the mixed reviews. But I was still grateful for the rest and the beer. We were seated near another American couple. The male half kept raving about the Florentine steak he ordered, which was 800 grams. Bistecca alla Florentine seems to be Florence’s most famous dish. Every restaurant we visited had their own version of it. The guy tried to talk us into ordering the steak. I had to admit, it smelled great. But we knew we would be having it on Friday night, when we met our tour. So I had fried fishy stuff, instead. Bill had beef tagliata, which is steak with rucola and Parmesan cheese.

The American guy who had the steak was so impressed that he came back twice more to tell us! It was pretty funny! I wonder if he had it again during his visit. He looked like he enjoyed steak a lot, if you catch my drift. But then, so do I. 😉 I think if I was going to have steak Florentine, I would pick a slightly more upscale place. In spite of the lukewarm reviews, we had a good time.

Edited to add: Thanks to the Dream store photo below, I figured out that we dined at Ristorante Pizzeria Ginori. I knew the name started with a G.

After we ate, we went back to the hotel and crashed. It had been a long day, and we had big plans for Thursday morning. More on that in the next post.