There's something about Florence that feels different than the typical large Italian city. Known as a city where greats like Michelangelo, Donatello, Machiavelli (Austin's favourite), Da Vinci (Carly's favourite), and Galileo came from or did their work, it retains much of the positive, inspiring vibe from the Renaissance. The first day we arrived, we got a taste on what an inland city felt like: HOT. So hot that we had to alter our ambitious sightseeing plans slightly to accommodate our slower speed.

We did, however, still manage to climb the Duomo, do a walk of the city, and even stumbled across a beautiful outdoor Orchestra and Opera concert all in the span of our first half day.

The second day was spent renting a scooter from a guy that listed out pretty much everything that can go wrong while driving in Florence before he handed us the keys. We took it out to the Tuscan countryside where Carly had set up a winery and lunch tour for us at a beautiful castle winery. There we were: me driving a gutless vespa and Carly sitting behind me with her paper map stretched out across my back as she yelled, "Right...left!" We managed to get there on time despite a couple of detours and we pulled in next to the other couples that rented comfy, air-conditioned sports cars for the day. We decided to just embrace being the adventurers of the group.

After a huge Tuscan lunch made entirely from ingredients from the winery's farm, we headed back to Florence, filled up our scooter tank (paid 50 euros for 2.50 euros worth of gas...long story), and enjoyed our last evening strolling up to a beautiful plaza viewpoint. The next morning on our way out of town we stopped to see Michelangelo's David and ended up being the only ones in the room with it. It was our last bit of Renaissance inspiration before we trekked back to the train station to take our next train to Naples.