Fiesole...

Our last trip in Italy was to Fiesole, a small hill town overlooking Florence. Days of little sleep and traveling from city to city had caught up with us in Florence and we needed a break from city life. Fiesole was just the right remedy for our weary souls. Unfortunately we were unable to recharge our digital camera battery so we have no digital pictures of Fiesole (I pulled these pictures off the web).

The bus from Florence to Fiesole runs up a winding road and stops at the center of Fiesole by the cathedral and clock tower. Center of town is quaint but not quiet; Fiat's buzz around the circle in all directions. We meandered on to a side street where we found a beautiful view of the countryside from a park bench. The wonderful thing about vacation is that when you find a park bench with a view you can just sit there and do nothing for as long as you want (or until your butt goes numb). And so we sat.

Daily gelato treats are a must when Italy. After we had our gelato break we felt filled with super human strength and decided to make the climb up toward the Franciscan chruch located on the very tippy top of the Fiesolean hill. Midway up the climb is a park of rememberence which is in part dedicated to 4 men who gave up their lives to save the inhabitants of Fiesole from Nazi soldiers. The view is panoramic and entirely quiet. This was Kristin's favorite part of our whole Florence portion of the Italy trip. We savored the view for quite a while on another park bench and then hiked up to the beautiful Franciscan church and monastery. On the way back down the hill we stopped at a purse shop and Kristin purchased a nice leather purse. I purchased a leather walet (only to find out later that it was made in China!).