2014 Volleyball Tour Day 8 Grosseto to
Pisa to Florence
We awoke this morning with mixed emotions… one emotion was that we wanted to extend our stay here in Marina, the other was that we really did want to see Pisa and Florence. Most of us had packed our bags the night before just to make sure we would not forget anything (we stayed in Grosseto for 4 days and most of our rooms looked like a disaster area…. Mixed clean and dirty clothes all over the place… and not even know WHO’S clothes belonged to whom..).
8:30am on the dot our BIG Motor Coach arrived and we started loading our bags into its BELLY. Auro; our local host who showed us such a wonderful time was away at a tournament and was not there to say goodbye to us…
The weather was a little overcast but still warm as we made our way out of the Marina. In no time at all Marina was miles behind us… some slumbered quietly, others stared out into the TUSCAN hills and others were reviewing all of the really cool photos that they had taken during our stay in Marina.
In about 2 hours time we arrive to Pisa … Most of us were not really sure what it was that we were going to go see… but when we entered, and past through the walled fortress it was almost surreal. The Church, the Baptistery and the tower itself were incredible… We sort of stood there in disbelief, 1. Because we were really here and 2. How amazing it looked.
The first thing we did was to take our GROUP photo of the leaning tower….. Then we all scattered like runaway cats… taking snapshots of each other holding up the tower… even some of us had to be held up while posing that we were holding up the tower… (it is a difficult and challenging task to stand on a post…. Have your hands the right angle, smile at the camera …… and not fall off the post….).
It was also LUNCH time… we had about 2 hours to get … photos, lunch, AND…. shopping done…. So we had to hurry…
We all met at our meeting point at the scheduled time… and then it was back into the Motor Coach for a 1 hour ride to Florence…
We were so excited showing each other what we had bought on our shopping spree in Pisa we hardly realized that we had arrived to Florence.
It was only a 5 minute walk tour hotel… and only about 5 minute wait while the rooms were assigned and we were in our AIR CONDITIONED ROOMS… Ahhhhh it felt good… because outside it was about 85 degrees.
John gave us some time to get settled in and rest before we started our tour.
The reason we are doing the hop on hop off tour now is because many of the parents wanted to go inside the Academia and Ufizzi to see the art work..... If we do the bus tour tonight it will free up more time tomorrow for them to do that.
We hopped on the bus at about 3:30pm this afternoon for our tour of the city… It was nice at that time as the temperature was only about 80 degrees…. The big bus wound our way around the really narrow streets of Florence that seemed the size that would fit a Volkswagen.. and yet… here we were in a double Decker bus. The narration
was interesting but we could have done without the Baroque music in the back ground….
Soon we were at Michelangelo’s Plaza high above the city… looking out at all of the morning colors and thinking to ourselves … THIS WAS THE PLACE…. Back in the day… if you were a painter, artist, sculptor, designer, architect etc….. THIS is where the cutting edge of the arts was happening…
We took our group photo and then continued onto the tour… The rest of the afternoon was free for us to continue to the other lines of the tour or to go shopping or go into some of the museums (if the lines were not too long)… and we did most all of those things…
Florence (For Dummies)
The home of the Renaissance and the modern world as we know and love it. After emerging from the Dark Ages and the Black Death (about 1350), Florence became prosperous as a center of the textile trade. Certain families became fabulously wealthy and became the patrons of scholars and artists who had new ideas about the world. Those ideas included the study of the natural world (which lead to the development of the science and technology that makes our way of life possible), the importance of the individual (which inspired not only the great artists of the Western world, but helped inspire the American Founding Fathers to craft our constitution and Bill of Rights), and the importance of cultivating of the mind and creativity. These trends can be seen in the Dome of the Florence Cathedral designed by a man named Brunelleschi, it was the largest
dome constructed since the time of Ancient Rome and demanded the use of advanced mathematical concepts and the invention of new machines to build it. Nearby you will see famous works of art like the Doors of Paradise on the Baptistery by Donatello and Michelangelo’s David.
Prior to going to dinner….. everyone and reviewed the RULES of TRAVEL…. And WHEN our CURFEW IS… and what will happen if we do not follow the RULES…
Groups of 4 or more headed to different restaurants for dinner…. Russ will be at the door making sure…
Tomorrow … Parents want to go to the museums.... Players will do a walking tour of Florence
This morning we could hear the chirping of the song birds, the whoo whooing of owls off in the distance, but most of all we could hear the cawing of the seagulls… no not cawing… but rather the howling cat like sounds as the would taunt each other from the roof tops just outside our hotel window…. I am still amazed at how loud these birds can screech… and as the day light gets brighter …. The louder the birds get..
The bus ride was only about 30 minutes long and we quickly arrive at the airport. We quickly found our check in counter and jumped in line with all the other folks who were returning home from Venice today. Our group said goodbye to each other and off through the security lines we went…. Once past security we found lots of duty free stores to spend our last Euros …. It seemed to take forever waiting for them to call our boarding announcement. As we took off we could look out at the Island of Venice and get an even better view of this amazing city…. 
