Today we got up early again to go to the airport to leave for Rome.  We took a coach to Florence and arrived around 2:30 in the afternoon.  After checking in to the hotel, we took a short walking tour.  We went to visit the Duomo, a beautiful cathedral and the first with a dome.  From there we visited Ponte Vecchio.  The streets were extremely packed because of the last day of Christmas Celebration.  We got a chance to see a really great parade where men, women, boys, and girls of all ages were dressed in the attire of the early periods of history in honor of Jesus' birth.  I got the chance to taste the gelato everyone said was so good.  They were absolutely right.  Even though it was cold outside, I enjoyed the ice cream.  For dinner we went to a pizzeria after doing a little shopping.  I had a pepperoni pizza.  I really didn't think it was as good as the pizza I'm used to here but it was still okay.  After dinner the entire group went to popular dance club.  There were other groups there from Australia and South Africa which was pretty cool.  After leaving the club, I did a little more shopping.  I decided to put my haggling skills to work again to buy a purse.  I ended up paying 15 euro for a really nice suede purse. 

On the way back to the hotel I got this really weird feeling that something wasn't right.  It turns out that this guy had been following us for a long time.  We started walking faster and so did he.  I was getting a little scared.  Thankfully, we ended up walking down a street with more people and he turned around and walked the other way.  I had mixed feelings about Florence because of the good and bad experiences.  Something interesting though, is that a lot of men were hitting on us and staring.  I found out that in general, Italians like darker skinned people.  I really liked the way the people dressed as well.  I rarely saw anyone in tennis shoes and t-shirts.  Most people wore jeans, boots, and nice sweaters.  I also noticed a lot of people wearing long coats and scarves because it was so cold.  The people were very fashionable.

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