Day 5 - Rome to Florence

I feel like crap. Something I ate last night isn't sitting well with me. No more beefa-steaka for me-a.

We are currently on a train going from Rome to Florence. The cab ride from the hotel was pretty uneventful, except that I had luggage in my lap. Two garment bags plus my laptop bag (or as amy calls it, my manbag). The limo service sent over a car for 5 people. It just didn't have enough room for 5 people and their luggage.

Amy is now taking over the blog - I am feeling even worse now.....
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So - since I am taking over, I will tell you what I experienced on day 5. After the 1 and 1/2 hour train ride, we arrived in the beautiful city of Florence. Much different than Rome - smaller, less fast paced and definitely less traffic!! Our hotel is located right by the Ponte Vecchio (the bridge with all of the shops - especially jewelry!). The hotel is not bad except for the stairs - you have to go up 25 to get to the elevator which can only hold one or two people at a time. So if you get inpatient waiting for the lift (like me) then you end up walking up the rest of the stairs (which is a lot). Our room is BIG (unlike Roma) and pretty nice.

My day was spent trying to do laundry. My mom and I went in search of a self-service laundromat with all of the dirty clothes (I was pulling a medium sized suitcase with all of ours.....). The hotel gave us a map and we decided to walk (didn't look too bad on the map). Boy was that the wrong idea!! Imagine if you can me with the big suitcase pulling it down the narrow stone streets (or even narrower stone walkways) dodging cars and people. Behind me is my 66 year old mother (don't tell her I told you that!) with her bad hip carrying her bag of dirty laundry. And what looked to be close took us at least 25 minutes to get there. Relieved, sweaty but proud of ourselves for finding the laundromat, we put all of our clothes in washers and tried to buy tokens for the washing machines. None of the token machines worked....... and there was no attendant there and no other customers. So - we had to pack up everything and go back to the hotel. Needless to say, I insisted that we get a taxi!!!! (I SO felt like cussing at that point!).

Once back at the hotel, we found another laundromat through the front desk and went in search of it (this time with a taxi). We finally ended up at a cleaners that also had self-service...... but this place only had four machines (which were all full) and two dryers. My mom and I were determined to wash our clothes - it was now not only a necessity, but it was also an adventure. So - we sat there for about three hours in the heat of the dryers waiting for our d#@^ laundry to finish. I felt like I had won a gold medal at the olympics when we had finally finished. But the cool thing was that we met several interesting Americans at the cleaners. And my mom and I both agree that it is one experience on this trip we will never forget. It does make you appreciate what you have at home - I think I'll kiss my washer and dryer when I get back!

As for Andy - he was sick the whole day. I felt so sorry for him. He slept, drank sprite, or jumped out of bed to run to the restroom. He is definitely enjoying the bidet!! (hope that doesn't gross too may of you out!). Hopefully he will be better tomorrow.

My parents and I and Jacob went out for dinner. We have found a local place that is AWESOME!! But we had to tell Andy that it was really bad since we didn't want him to feel like he missed something really great. We had bruschetta (I think I am spelling that right?), antipasti, chicken, pork, garlic veggies, tuscan beans, panna cotta with chocolate sauce (an 'oh my god' dessert), tiramisu and of course - limoncello!! All in all, a great meal that made up for the crappy day that my mom and I experienced! Hope all is well. We miss you all - we are getting a little homesick!!