Italia_2013: Tuscany, part 1

The intent after leaving Verona was to get to Florence for a quick trip to the Duomo and then head on to our rental in Tuscany. The highway after Bologna is somewhat harrowing but John handled it like a champ. When we arrived in the Florence suburbs, we had dueling GPS directions, between our car GPS and the one on my phone. .eventually, we arrived at the train station and parked in the underground parking area. We had a light lunch near the library of San Lorenzo, then walked through the market to get to the Duomo. We admired the replicas of the Ghiberti doors before moving on to the cathedral.

The girls had become adept at slipping a skirt over their shorts in order to get past the guards monitoring tourists' suitability for entering the cathedral. . After a bit there, electing not to climb the steps to the Duomo or the bell tower, we wandered through the mercato a bit more before going back to the car.
Even though it was only an hour and a half from Florence to Casa bel Posto (the name of our rental), we had some trepidation about the complexity of the directions. Tania, our host, had given excellent landmarks and we arrived by 7. We had just enough time to unload the van and while the girls all were ready to go into their excellent pool, John and Alison made a quick dash to the Coop (local grocery store) to get some things for dinner. John once again made spaghetti with sausage, which was excellent, but we declared a moratorium on sausage for awhile.

The house was perfect. Three bedrooms, 2 baths and a large common area:

The girls were excellent about cleaning up after dinner:

Greg and I went to sleep (coincidentally on our 34th wedding anniversary) to the wonderful sound of the family laughing over a card game.

The next day was a needed day of rest for everyone. The girls spent most of it in the pool. John drove Greg and I to the grocery store for more supplies. . I adore shopping at European markets but it was a free for all, particularly two hours before the market shut on a Sunday afternoon. The produce section provides some challenges, because you have to (or should) use gloves to pick out your selection, then need to memorize the product code, go to one of the scales, weigh it and affix the stamp to the plastic bag. There was only one scale that was functioning consistently and there was a lot of competition. Ultimately, we got a lot of fruit, vegetables, chicken, hamburger patties,breakfast things, sandwich fixings and various beverages for 148 euro or app. 193 dollars. . .considering that every time the seven of us sat at a restaurant, it was 100-130 bucks, you can see that cooking for ourselves was definitely cost effective.
The afternoon was more relaxation and the girls got to know the two dogs, Murphy and Stella. Stella was particularly enamored of Julia who was a bit intimidated at first her doggy enthusiasm.