The Uffizi

We had 11:30 tickets for the Uffizi today--the actual tickets, not just vouchers. So the line was not too long and the whole museum felt less crowded than some of the others we've been in.  We thought people should be at church but many of them were not. At 11 on the square of Santa Maria Nuovo, the traditional Easter fireworks occur. We couldn't go but our host had made us watch a movie of them on the computer. What it looked like was a big box and the fireworks seemed to just go in circles close to the ground. However, we don't know how the movie ended because it was too boring. Our host, Franco, looked up how to say "a couple of oxen" to say that is what carries the box away from the square. When we were there later in the day, there was no sign of box or oxen.

Our new thing in museums is to take the elevators that are reserved for people with limited mobility. No one ever stops us and this elevator today even had an attendant. Otherwise, you have to walk up a gigantic staircase. There's only two levels to the museum but the top one seems to be 4 stories high. We walked down the staircase after the tour.

Again, you can spend an hour looking at each individual ceiling:

some ceiling panels in the Uffizi

You never get an explanation of who did the ceilings. I am convinced there was a craigslist back in the day, probably caesarslist.com where you could hire ceiling painters.

The museum is huge so you have to pick and choose how to spend your time. Here's a Michaelangelo sculpture which is of someone, the guess is it's Venus:

 

And finally, what everyone goes to see, Venus on the Half-Shell (Birth of Venus). Rick Steves claims only Americans call it half-shell; I thought that was its real name:

That was the only picture that was a little hard to get close to, similar to the Mona Lisa at the Louvre.

There's a lovely terrace at the top of the building. Here is the tower you can see--not sure if it's part of the Uffizi:

After the Uffizi, we found a highly-recommended coffee shop close to us, called Procacci. Our hosts had asked us whether we liked truffles which of course, everyone does.  They sell tiny sandwiches--we sampled the foie gras and truffles and had a "light lunch" and wine. I had eggs with truffles and Lola had cauliflower with a truffle cheese sauce which was the best dish anyone has ever made. It was a great experience.  Then we found the only macaron store we've seen in Italy. These have more filling than you would get in a French macaron--not as good as the French but very good nevertheless. We saved those for later so we could get gelato on the Santa Maria Nuovo Square. It was a beautiful afternoon and everyone was doing that so we went along with the crowd. Here's the square:

The crowds seemed to have thinned out somewhat this evening and it was raining so we went to a restaurant we've been to before. They have the best appetizer--chicken liver pate on toasty bread (crostini). Their house wine is also very good. Tomorrow is our 11 hour tour of Tuscany so it's early to bed, after the macarons.