That is the question our vast following here on the web must have been asking.  Alas, we were unexpectedly stranded without internet access.  And it often seemed so close!  While our hotel in Venice had internet access, we have an older computer that could not connect with their system.  They even had an older system but our computer did not have a strong enough wifi receiver to make it work.  Ahh, the challenges of travelling in the internet age!

Since our last post we've been to Venice, returned to Florence, seen Tracy off to her workshop on the Spiritual and Art Practice, and Richard off to Pisa where he writes this on the hotel PC (with its European keyboard) shortly before heading back to SF.  Much ground to cover and little time.  In short:

Venice is wonderful, marvelous, amazing, and many other over the top positive adjectives.

Light, color, sky, architecture, art, and history are some of the dimensions of the above.

We got to spend an afternoon and evening with the Grubbs-Rider clan!

St.Marks is a wonder of the world.

The Biennale was so wonderful Richard dropped all plans to sightsee and spent all day for for two days at the show.  The exhibition spaces alone were incredible and much of the art just amazing.

On the day we left we saw a separate exhibit, Infinitum, that knocked our socks off.

Food highlights were our first italian pizza, lemon-basil gelato, and a seafood-green bean salad.

Technology caused Richard a small heart murmur when the GPS on his iPhone told him his train was headed to Rome instead of Pisa – fortunately it corrected itself before more serious health consequences ensued.

Pisa has a botanical garden that allows you to photograph the leaning tower emerging from jungle vegetation much like a Mayan temple at Tikal.

There you have it!  There may be some more reflective posts after a few days.  We shall see. 

Thanks for reading!

     Today we broke out of the museum pattern and spent the day
wandering around town.  Our initial
destination was the produce (and meat, and fish, and grappa) market at San
Lorenzo.  It is a massive hall that
dwarfs the SF Ferry Plaza.  It is
always a wonderful thing to look at fresh produce and is even better when it’s a
just a bit different as it is here. 
Everything was gorgeous!  In
one shop we spoke to a very helpful young Florentine who hails originally from
Oregon.  She is in school here and
says the job market is way better than Oregon.  We made or way home zigzagging through town succeeding in
keeping most of our shopping to the window- variety.  We had a bit of rain today which blessedly dropped the temp
below 90.  It made walking about so
much more pleasant (there may be a short essay on the heat in a later post).

Dinner tonight was again wonderful.  Nice simple bruscheta with the ripest
melt in your mouth tomatoes you can imagine, an anchovy salad, and a slow
braised beef with peppercorns and various secret ingredients.   We’ve been asked if the meals are
expensive and the answer is yes, but only because everything in Florence is
expensive!  The prices we’ve paid
have been reasonable by Florence standards.  We’ve found most places through our guidebook and we’ve
limited ourselves to places that are a 1 or 2 on their 4 point scale.

Tomorrow we are off to Venice where we hear things are even
more expensive than Florence – we shall see!

Our reservations for David were even earlier than for the
Ufizzi so we already had a bigger challenge compounded by having had even more
wine (a very big Sicilian albo de vevera) than the night before.  Still we made it in plenty of
time.  The David matched the
build-up of the hype.  I found
myself just gazing first at a foot, then a hand, then a muscle on the leg, a
vein on the arm, all perfect.  The
museum has a show of Mapplethprpe’s work going on right now that provides an
exquisite match helping the viewer to become immersed in form and the artists’
fascination with form.  I’ve always
enjoyed M’s work but seeing it the context of David and other sculptures at the
Accademia took it to a new level. 
The rest of the day we spent wandering town, napping, washing clothes,
and catching up on the blog. 
Spending time in our room I was reminded of Florence’s textile heritage
– I love our drapes!

 Dinner was a simple affair just down the
street.  Though I’ve never ordered
steak and eggs at home, seeing them offered with asparagus and truffles was
irresistible and it was 
a tasty affair indeed!