Climbing the Duomo and Wine Tasting in Chianti

First in line at 8am!

A few weeks before leaving on our trip, we started digging in deeper to the activities of Florence to determine what we wanted to book or reserve. One of the more unique things we discovered was the climb to the top of the Duomo. For around 20 euros, you can gain entrance into the Baptistery of San Giovanni, Santa Reparata, Giotto's Bell Tower, Museo dell'Opera del Duomo and Brunelleschi's Dome. Keep in mind, you MUST have a reservation time in order to climb the dome and once you select it, it cannot be changed. We decided to pick the earliest time, 8:30am, so that we wouldn't have to worry too much about a crowd. In fact, we got in line at 8 to get ahead of the crowd even more - and were first in line! Coupled with the fact that we were at sea level, it allowed us to move pretty quickly up the 463 steps. Yup, you read that right. 463 steps and pretty much straight up in a very narrow stairwell, in a circular motion. The stairs you climb are actually the stairs that were used to build the dome years ago and while it was a fun workout (feel the burn in the legs) it made me dizzy! Ha! I had to pause more to stop the spinning versus rest my legs. :) Right at the top, you practically climb up a ladder to pop out at the top and get the most incredible views of Florence.

Panoramic view of Florence

The steepness of the stairs

After our climb, we walked back to the house to shower and clean up, but had to stop for some gelato first. Hey, we just climbed up 463 steps, we earned those calories!

After we cleaned up, we slowly started walking toward the train station for our next tour pickup. As we made our way through town, we stopped by the Medici Chapels (fee required, which we didn't pay), the burial site of the Medici family, and then went to Mercato Centrale, a market with everything you could wish for. Outside of the market there are a lot of vendors selling leather, scarves, anything you could want, and you can bargain for a good deal, but inside the market is the good stuff. The lower level is essentially a farmers market with everything from butcher shops to fresh cheese, pasta, limoncello, the list goes on. If you head to the second level, you will find an open food court with so many options to eat - that aren't just Italian! Here we stopped to grab some lunch and people watch before meeting our tour group.

Near the train station of Florence, we met our tour guide, Barbara, and climbed aboard our bus to Tuscany. We both love Chianti wine, and I've always dreamed of driving through Tuscany to visit wine country. This tour drove us one hour into Tuscany, where we stopped at a couple of wineries, the capital of Chianti and a castle town before heading back to Florence.

Our tour guide Barbara was quite the show herself. Not only did she have incredible stories to share about the history of Italian wine, but she also did it in three languages! We had English, French and Spanish on our tour - and she told us she speaks five in total - wow!! While driving through, she told us how to recognize true Chianti Classico wine and what to look for. One the wine you buy at the store, there will be a small sticker near the cork of a black rooster. If the black rooster is on the bottle, this means it is true chianti classico, from this region. If it's not there, it came from a different region - not the real stuff!

Our first stop was a family owned winery called Riseccoli, that was built in 1635. This winery is owned by the family of Romano Romanelli - an artist who created the bronze bust of Benvenuto Cellini, that you can find on the Ponte Vecchio bridge. The winery is very small and doesn't distribute outside of their walls. They make 10,000 bottles a year, but due to modern technology can bottle all of that within two hours. And yes, we bought a bottle to bring home. :)

With our bottle in Tuscany!

Our next stop was Greve in Chianti, the capital of the Chianti region. Here we had about 30 minutes to shop, drink some wine, get a snack or some gelato and just explore. Because it was such a small town, it was here that I really experienced how much the residents appreciate you trying even a little to speak their language. We got some free sweet treats because I at least tried. 

Next up was our second winery stop, called Poggio Amorelli. Another winery that does not distribute, but is so famous that the Forbes family comes here for wine. We met our sommelier, Lorenzo (such incredible knowledge and humor), out front who gave us some history of the winery before taking us inside. At this winery, they do not share any of their grapes with other wineries, nor do they accept any. The chianti reserve grapes are picked especially by the owner, before the other employees take over. He also taught us that in the Chianti region, they don't irrigate, because they don't need to. The climate of the region creates the great wine and grapes all on its own.

Lorenzo

When we went inside, we had a selection of wines and balsamic vinegars to taste. A couple of tidbits we learned - when looking at your wine, if it has a violet color on the side of the glass, it means it is a younger wine. And when purchasing balsamic vinegar (which we don't really use), look for the IGP DOP certification - this means it is the best of the best from this region.

We left deciding to ship three bottles home. We weren't planning to ship wine home, but it was only $5 a bottle (with a three bottle minimum rather than six) so we decided to do three and keep a couple on our shelves for years to come!

Our last stop before heading home was a small town called Castellina in Chianti, which translates to, small castle town. And yes, there was a small castle. While this town was beautiful, we had such a short amount of time here that we pretty much walked the street, took a photo and headed for the bus. We took a short nap on the way back because we weren't feeling well. Oh yeah, did I mention that we were sick this whole afternoon? Around lunch time, we started feeling tired, but just thought it was the busy morning. Nope. A full on fever hit me, and Bryan was close behind and we just had to keep powering through. This was the part of the trip that I was probably looking forward to the most, I wasn't going to let a little fever get in the way! Why do I share this with you? Just so you know the whole trip wasn't picture perfect. Ha!

After getting back to Florence, we stopped for dinner and then went home so we get some much needed sleep.......we were hiking the next day! More to come on Cinque Terre next time.......