With a multitude of places to eat and drink, you are spoiled for choice. We chose to visit Rivoire https://rivoire.it/ an historic cafe/chocolate shop. Goodness me what a treat – hot chocolate so thick that the biscuit you get with it stands up by it’s self! Hand stitched tea bags. It is a place of elegance and people watching! We loved it so much we visited twice! There is so much history in Florence and it isn’t just the buildings or the art. Even the humble cafe or porchetta sandwich bar have decades/centuries of history. It makes you realise again, that we are here such a short while and a long time gone. We spend more time, being In the Moment.

We spent the afternoon walking through the Vasari Corridor. If you’ve seen Tom Hanks in the Dan Brown film Inferno, you will recognise the Vasari Corridor as the escape route taken by the main characters. After a number of years being closed to visitors, it reopened last year. It is a place I have always wanted to see and was thrilled to have been able to walk in the footsteps of the Medici – and Tom Hanks! Entrance is via the Uffizi Gallery and you are escorted in small groups along the 1km long corridor. It is breathtakingly simple. At the end, you exit into the Pitti Palace just by the Grotto. We decide to save this vast and imposing Palace for another trip.

There is so much to see and do in Florence – you could go from one museum to another, one art gallery to another, one market to another. I think the way we planned our trip – two things we both really wanted to do and no other major plans gave us time to just wander, look and experience the city slowly. To be able to spontaneously  say – look a rooftop bar, let’s go! Besides, if you are rushing from one place to the next, you might not spot these…