FourFirths: Climbing the Duomo

May 4, 2012

Today it was up early. The breakfast at the convent is great. My favorite part is that they serve pitchers of hot milk at the table. The kids make hot chocolate, and I like to put it over Muesli. We had a great meal before packing up and checking out. The nuns are great about letting us leave our car there while we head back into Florence. It is about a 45 minute walk to the Duomo. We made it in record time and were happy to find that there wasn’t much of a line to get in to climb to the top. It wasn’t too crowded, so we had time to take pictures. The dome is decorated with The Last Judgement, by Giorgio Vasari, and shows the dead, rising from their graves into a multilevel heaven to be judged by a radiant Christ, with Mary interceding beneath. The scenes from Hell are pretty graphic…

There was a mass going on down below. We could hear the priest speaking and I felt like a fly on the wall…

Then it was time to climb up the Dome. Brunelleschi’s design incorporated a double dome with an inner and outer portion. It was so interesting being able to walk between the two domes. There are a total of 463 steps from the ground to the top of the dome.

The kids enjoyed climbing up over the curves.

The scenery was stunning from up here, so we spent some time enjoying the fresh air.

Then we headed back down.

This is the herringbone brick pattern Brunelleschi used for additional strength.

On the way down there is a room with some of the things that Brunelleschi invented and left behind. Some of the things he invented, including cranes to lift the stones and bricks were in use until the 1950’s, almost 600 years.

Danika in front of Giotto’s Campanile.

I tried to get everything into the picture...

We spent a lot of time walking through all of the market stalls. The prices had gone down since we were here in March, so that was a bonus :)

All too soon it was time to head back to Perugia. Again, the drive was incredibly beautiful, and by the time I would get the camera up and press it to take the picture, it was usually too late. Pictures just can’t do justice to how incredible everything looks.