Fiesole!

Views of Florence from Fiesole... you can see the Duomo sticking above everything else in the middle-ish of these picturs.

It was SO windy up there, but at least the rain decided to let us have five minutes for pictures.

Ashley, from the other apartment, scolding me for taking pictures.

I do what I want! Gosh...

We went on a short trip outside of Florence to Fiesole today. Fiesole was perched up on the hills long before Florence existed and was home to the Etruscans (from whom the Romans "borrowed" a good chunk of their culture and technology from). In 1125 Fiesole was conquered by it's neighboring Florentines and became a part of Florence and can now be reached by bus #7 in 15 minutes from the Duomo.

A portion of the ancient city. This part was the baths... the pools and gymnasium were in the front portion, you can see a re-construction portion of the heating units (the red brick bits) on the right. The heated pools were in the back towards the arches and the potty rooms were also back there. Apparently going to the bathroom was a social event, you'd just plop right down next to your neighbor, stick your feet in a trough of cold water to get your personal plumbing up and running, and then camp out for a while. No joke.

The Etruscans also used radiant heat to heat the walls, floors and ceilings of the baths (red clay pipes funnelled the heat from the furnace through all surfaces, making everything nice and cozy.

The arches you can see from the above picture... you can see a bit of town on the left and clock tower.
Elizabeth Milliken, my Women's History, World History and Film class teacher.
And Ian Priestman who teaches my Human Relations class.
A shot of the Theater (also a reconstruction) that was absolutely masive, like everything in Europe... except the cars or apartments.
Little cast figures in the museum. I took these pictures before I realized I was actually in a museum (it looked like a little room) so I stopped because I'm pretty sure that no matter where in the world you go, you're still not supposed to be taking pictures in museums. I'm still not sure why that is... other than the fact that it might be disrespectful or something. Ah well...




These are the girls in the second apartment. Eventually I'll get to know them better, but for now they are "The girls from the other apartment" because there are many more of them, than there are of us.
The clock tower in town... again, the rain took a break for five seconds!