Friday, November 30, 2012

Civitavecchia, Italy 2















 Civitavecchia, Italy 2

We walked to the Cathedral of the Diocese of Civitavecchia, originally known as the Church of St. Francis, which was fairly close to the harbour entrance. It was interesting to visit this rather small and humble church compared to the large churches we saw in Florence. I've uploaded 15 photos of this church including the religious art and some stained glass windows.





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Thursday, November 29, 2012

Civitavecchia, Italy 1















Civitavecchia, Italy 1

Our fourth port of call on the Liberty of the Seas was Civitavecchia, the port of Rome. We had booked an excursion to Tarquinia, a medieval town nearby, but it was cancelled at the last minute because of a lack of participation. Since we didn't really feel like booking a long excursion to Rome because we had been on the road 10 hours the previous day, we decided to explore the town of Civitavecchia. It was very overcast, but we decided to go ashore until the rain began.

One of the first things I noticed was the clothes hung out of apartment windows and on balconies. I stopped at a tourist information booth to pick up a map and the young lady told me about an interesting church and market nearby. We easily found the church and market, then wandered around the streets for a while. When the rain started, we headed back to the ship. After lunch, the rain stopped so I went ashore again and walked along the beach for a while.

I only took about 200 photos in this town and will share a few for the next couple of days. In Civitavecchia there were few tourists even though there were 3500 people on our ship and there were a couple of other large cruise ships in port. I assume most people took tours to Rome.



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Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Florence, Italy 14















       Florence, Italy 14


This is the last of the Florence Series for now.  As I said previously, if I were to return to this city some day. I definitely would not do a tour, but rather, explore the city on my own.  The city is the where the Renaissance started after the Dark Ages and the art, sculptures, and architecture is amazing,  I've tried to share some of this with you over the past 14 days just give you a sense of that it is like to walk through the old streets of the historical district.

I don't know the significance of the cross with two arms.  I did a quick Google search but didn't find anything relevant.  Maybe someone reading this will know.  I've uploaded other images of the art on the church and a couple of buildings in the square.  We boarded the bus not long after I made these images and drove an hour and a half back to the ship.  As you can imagine, driving through the Tuscan countryside was very beautiful but I didn't get photos because the lighting was wrong for taking pictures through a glass window.
I appreciate your comments regarding the beauty of the city of Florence and the "thank-yous" for sharing the photos.  I find it interesting that some of you are "loving" the photos and enjoying the virtual tour and others would prefer that I stopped sharing images of my photo trip to Europe and Asia.  Hopefully the addition of a Newfoundland and Labrador Link of the Day is satisfying those of you who are missing photos of our province.





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Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Florence, Italy 13
















Florence, Italy 13

Today's photos include a series of images of the sculptures on the facade of the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence. One sculpture shows a religious figure from the 13th century who appears to be pointing to a book. Since it a church, I assume it may be the Bible, but I am not certain. I found it interesting that it looks like he is looking out through a window.

I shared a few images of the statue of Dante already, but included a couple more today. In case you are interested, Dante is buried in Ravenna, Italy not Florence.





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Hydrangeas

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