Arno tour

CAPA advertised a classic river boat tour of the Arno this week, so I went with a few friends last night after school let out. I forget the name of it, but we went in the same boat they used during the Roman period to drag sand from the bottom of the river to use in making the buildings in Florence. We set out around 6:45 P.M., just as the sun was setting; it was the perfect time of day to be on the water at the Ponte Vecchio.

This is the Uffizi Gallery, a large art museum in Florence. "Uffizi" in Italian means "offices." This building used to be the offices for the Medici family. It was nice to see it from the water, since we walk past it almost every day.

The square windows with the grates covering them run along the Medici corridors which run from the Uffizi, over the Ponte Vecchio and to the Boboli Gardens. The Medici family had these corridors built so they could travel safely around the city in tumultuous times.

These are the only remaining original houses on the Arno next to the Ponte Vecchio; the rest were destroyed in the bombings of WWII.

I forget the name of this tower, but it stands in "Piazza Purgato" where they used to bury children (hence the name). This can only be seen from the Arno because of the buildings surrounding it on three sides.
These are the only remaining original houses along the Arno next to the Ponte Vecchio; the others were destroyed in the bombings of WWII.

This little guy was looking down over the side of the bridge as we went under. Cosimo de Medici wanted the animals on this bridge to be a ram because he was a Capricorn. As you can see, this is a little creepy and/or scary. Legend has it that the Ram on the East side of the bridge is angry and upset because he can see the flood coming, whereas the one on the other side is more at peace because he can't. The angry one was definitely more difficult to pass under without getting the heebie-jeebies.

I apologize for the crappy formatting. As you can tell I'm new to blogger so I'm still getting the hang of things. And it's time for me to head on home for the day, so I'm just going to post this in its incomplete state.