Our Italy Trip Chronologically II: San Marco Church

Our next stop was the San Marco Church, one of many churches we would viist.

The inside was pretty ornate, just check out the altar and the ceiling.

Yes, that's the ceiling.

Lots of giant paintings adorn the walls. Too bad it's so dark in there. It's really hard to get a decent picture with little to no light.

And here's the body (or maybe a statue of a body) of a bishop we can't remember the name of.

Not too many pictures here, but just keeping you in the know.

More soon!

Our Italy Trip Chronologically: Duomo Museum

The very first thing we did after arriving the night before was go to the Duomo Museum. We were actually trying to get into the Duomo itself, but it wasn't open yet and we later found out that it wasn't open to the public that day. But in our wanderings, we found this museum which turned out to be one we had on our list.

So check out what we saw.

We saw lots of statues.

This was a giant lecturn for either a massive Bible or a massive hymnal.

Feed the baby!

This is a bronze representation of the beheading of John the Baptist. It was prtty large; probably 12 feet tall and 15 feet long (these are Jacob's estimates so  you can blame him if it's wrong.)

This is Michelangelo's Pieta, which, if you don't know the history is pretty interesting. It's an unfinished work by Michelangelo depicting the moving of Jesus's body off of the cross by Nicodemus, Mary, and Mary Magdelene. But apparently while he was making it, it wasn't turning out the way he wanted and he got angry and broke off a few pieces. But most of it was preserved and about half of it is done. It was really interesting to see an unfished statue, getting the idea of how it was formed. And apparently, Michelangelo gave his face to Nicodemus, so we got to see a glimpse of what the artist looked like, too.

This is a pretty scary representation of Mary Magdelene. We think she had to be a bit more attractive if she was a prostitute. But that's just us.

And his is amazing. This is made up of tiny tiny tiny pieces to make a mosaic. It was absolutely ridiculous!

They had a magnifying glass up to this one which showed the little pieces better. We tried to get a picture of that, but this was the best we could do. You just don't understand till you see it.

And this is a colored statue. Most of them were only one color, so this was interesting that it was painted.

And that was our visit to the Duomo Museum. We later found out that the finger of John the Baptist was at this museum, but we don't remember seeing the thing. This was a pretty good museum, lots of interesting things and not too large that it loses your interest.  So it was a good first stop.

More to come soon!

We're in Italy!

So we're in Italy, Florence to be exact. And we are loving it!

We got here on the 24th and will be here until the 31st. It has been and is going to continue to be a blast, and we'll try to put up pictures soon.

Decisions, Decisions

There are some definite plusses for taking this assignment in Libya.

1. We get more paid time off.

2. We are closer than ever to some amazing destinations.

Now we just have to decide where to go.

Our first trip is going to be for our birthdays and we are going to Italy. That's already been decided, but we have to choose where to go in Italy and what to do. We definitely want to see Florence for a few days, but what do you think? Where else should we go. We're thinking of taking a week for this first trip.

We also have to plan where we should go for Christmas time. It's basically the same price to go to Paris, Vienna, Frankfurt, Dublin, Athens, Madrid, and Brussels. So where to go, where to go? Any advice?