423 Steps

After a morning train ride full of peanut matches We arrived in Florence and promptly found our hotel. It's in a very old looking building and we had to climb 3 flights to check in but our room us
spacious and airy but unfortunatly has a bidet but no toilet, we have to walk down the hall.

We discovered that the only way to see the inside of the famous Brunelleschi Duomo right now is to climb it. So, 423 steps later we got our view, we were so close we could have touched the painting. In the includef picture you can see the interior of the dome. I was amazed at the vibrant colors and the detail portrayed in each scene.

Then we went to the outside of the dome for an amazing 360 view of Florence and Tuscany. Pictures from this are amazing, you'll see. The hike was totally worth the effort now, tomorrow morning we may feel differently. Now we earned some gelato.

PS from Sara-I have claustrophobia and Mom has a history of cluziness in foreign countries so I'm quite proud of us for making it through 856 steps! I'll send the iPhone pics if to my Flickr if you want to see them.