FLORENCE, CITY I LOVE

This was a trip long-awaited, and the day after my birthday we flew out at an ungodly hour to Bologna and hopped on a train forty minutes to Florence. We were back.

Straight off to see Jarv's "shoe guy" (Roberto Ugolini, a renowned artisan shoemaker, who has been working on a pair of shoes for Jarvis for, oh, the last two years now).

After half an hour of shoe aficionados talking shoe business (whilst I lolloped about uselessly in the armchair dreaming of lunch), we decided to stay South of the river and enjoy lunch in a busy restaurant nearby.

Afterwards, we decided to explore the Boboli Gardens (something we hadn't gotten around to doing the last two times we were here), where I turned into the nightmare girlfriend, grumbling about the heat and sweat and frustratingly itchy mosquito bites that had accumulated on my legs.

Pausing long enough, though, to appreciate the beauty of the gardens!

After we'd escaped the evil clutches of the mosquitoes, we enjoyed a leisurely stroll through the city towards our favourite rooftop bar, treating ourselves to gelato and appreciating the city's beauty on our way.

We spent the next two hours sprawled lazily (and rather giddily) across this corner of the city.

Finally, our apartment was ready for check-in and 7pm had rolled around, so we meandered back towards the Duomo. Coming across some interesting characters on the way:

The apartment (booked via airbnb) was fabulous - situated literally 50m away from the Duomo. If you've ever been to Florence, you'll know that everything is pretty walkable, but to be so close to the Duomo was such a pleasure. To be able to spring up off the sofa and say, "Let's go for a walk!" and have a midnight stroll by the magnificent piece of history was something I'll treasure forever. But more on that later.

We settled in, changed clothes for dinner, and off we went. I'll introduce you to the place next time!