Florence, Italy

Florence- We arrive into early morning into Rome with a scheduled flight to Florence. The flight to Florence was cancelled, so straight to plan B- we rented a car. By 10:00am we were on the crowded roadways of Rome and on our way to Florence.

This being our first trip to Europe, I had a a few assumptions about driving that turned out to be wrong. Oh well, first time for everything. As it turned out there is a speed limit. Also, the people of the 12th- 18th centuries did not lay out the cities to handle our modern day traffic. Getting to a city was easy, but figuring out how to arrive at the intended destination through the maze of confused roadways was an entirely differnt challenge. Driving in Florence causes confusion, frustration, and marital strife. Our 3 hour drive to Florence was fast and easy through beautiful countryside. Upon arriving in Florence we had a 2 hour experience driving down one way roads, squeezing though openings with 6 inches to spare on either side, and finding locals to give directions a minumum of 6 times. The most frustrating part was being within .5 mile of the hotel the whole time. We just never found the unmarked turn to the road of the Hotel. Finally through sheer accident we stumbled across it and our adventure began anew.