Luca and Guilio were easy to contact and very welcoming. The apartment was just as in the photos, but what the photos couldn't capture was the incredible buzz of the location. 5 minutes walk to the Uffizi gallery, ten minutes to Santo Spirito and only a few moments to the Pitti Palace. Prepare yourself for crowds and ridiculous taxi rides, as the drivers navigate the squeeziest alleys. Go east from the apartment down via dei Bardi for the Open Bar and Restaurant. Incredible little paninis and pastries to eat at the counter or take away, or a glamourous restaurant for those with the $$$. In the other direction just a few shops west along via dei Bardi, we bought beautiful silk-lined leather gloves at a good price, from a woman with two very endearing dachshunds. There is a supermarket across the road from the apartment and, although you hear all the sounds of a vibrant city, we felt secure. Lean out the bedroom window and watch the egrets and ducks, look for fish and eels and, if you're lucky, you might see a coypu, like a big muscrat. All this in a green, city river.

If you only go to one gallery, make it the Accademia, to see Michelangelo's unfinished figures, roughly hewn, and his exquisite sculpture of David. You can take a seat and soak it all up, much more civilized than some of the well-know galleries where you are hurried along without time to absorb the magnificence of what you're seeing (I'm thinking Sistine chapel, Mona Lisa at the Louvre and Guernica in the Prado). Florence is beautiful; you need at least a couple of days. We were able to keep our key till 2.30, which saved us from having to lug our cases around all day before our train to Florence.