30-Day Solo Travel in Europe | Day 20: Off to Florence & First Glimpse of David

(Previous chapter of my journey: Day 19: Milan Beyond the Shopping – Pinacoteca Ambrosiana & Pinacoteca di Brera)

On our last morning in Milan we realised it was the final Sunday of the month. My friend said there’s a market along the canals that only happens then, so we went to have a look. Stalls everywhere—second-hand fancy clothes, little handmade things, old postcards, even big bits of furniture. Nothing particularly cheap, but the place felt alive with people chatting and bargaining in all different languages. I bet it looks really pretty at night with the lights on the water.

We had a relaxed breakfast, then headed to the station. Picking up our bags in the hotel took longer than we thought, so we ended up running to catch the train. My friend just laughed and joked that she finally got to experience what it is like to rush for train in Europe.

A couple of hours later we arrived in Florence. Right away you can feel how old and full of history the city is. No underground trains here, just buses, trams, or walking (luckily most attractions are within walking distance). The sun was really hot when we stepped out of the station with our bags. Our first job of finding a ticket machine for the bus turned out to be harder than we expected. We walked back and forth a few times before we spotted the machine. It somehow made my first impression of Florence a tiny bit less magical.

Our room was small—no lift, no fridge. I had to get creative with the bottle of Moët I’d carried all the way from Paris: I stuck it right next to the air-con vent to keep it cool. Worked okay!

Most statues of David show him right after beating Goliath. But this one is different—he’s just standing there, sling in his hand, looking straight ahead. No intense action, but you can feel the strength and confidence in the way he stands and the way he’s looking into the distance. Is he about to fight the giant, or has he already won? Experts still argue about it. I think that’s what makes it special—you get to decide for yourself when you’re standing there looking up at him.

Afterwards we walked to the Duomo area for gelato. Ice-cream shops are everywhere so we just picked one that looked popular. In the evening the square in front of the cathedral was nice: street musicians playing, lights on the building. But there were also groups of young guys hanging around. One kept flashing his phone light at us trying to get our attention, another came right up, did a weird little dance, and said, 'It’s nice, isn’t it?' We had no idea if it was a scam or just them trying to chat us up. We laughed about it later and assumed they were probably 'Italian romance scammers'.

Florence feels like a place full of surprises!

Once we had dropped our bags, we headed straight to the Accademia Gallery to see Michelangelo’s David. The backstory is pretty cool: they had this enormous block of marble that nobody else could figure out how to use. At just 26, Michelangelo won the commission to turn it into a statue for the top of Florence’s cathedral (Santa Maria del Fiore). He worked on it for two years. The finished statue stands over 5 metres tall and weighs more than 6 tonnes. In the end it was too big and heavy to put on the roof, so it ended up inside the gallery instead.