Day Five (Evening)—October 4, 2007

Our hotel in Florence was back on the larger side, for the budget-minded traveler in Europe. We actually had a pretty nice view of a garden setting outside our window, but it seemed as if we could climb right out and stand on the ground. It seemed as if our room was only about 5’ off the ground, but I also know we had to be up a lot higher. I attribute my skewed perception at this point to the humidity.

I quickly hosed down my poor, abused sandals (and leaving them on the windowsill to dry...and hoping that anybody passing by wouldn’t hork them or succumb to their light scent), since it wouldn’t be long before we’d have to head out for our penultimate dinner party. Based on my experience in Rome a couple of nights before, in which I had, perhaps, just perhaps, indulged a bit too much in the fruit of the vine, I swore to myself that I wouldn’t drink myself under the table tonight. At least that was my intention...but the heat of Florence...I tell you, I didn’t know what I was doing.

Our dinner that night would be comprised of three entrées, dessert, and as much liquor as we could drink.

Three entrées. Three friggin’ entrées. And booze!

Our dinner wasn’t going to be in Florence proper, but in a small restaurant out in the hills outside the city. So after we were bundled into the bus, we crossed the Arno and started chugging our way up into the hills. Before hitting the restaurant, we had a quick stop at the Piazzale Michelangelo. Guess who you’ll find a replica statue of there. Go on, I dare you.

At any rate, the Piazzale Michelangelo is a pretty prime spot for getting a panoramic view of Florence just across the Arno. But as it was already past dusk—and dinner was waiting—we didn’t stay there long.

If my sense of direction is right, and it usually isn’t, the restaurant we were headed to was in the hills south of Florence. These hills were where the monied people of Florence live, and in the dying light we could see estates partially hidden behind rows of trees. We also passed by the Certosa del Galluzzo (or the Carthusian Monastery), which is a Benedictine monastery that looks like a walled fortress sitting on top of a hill. They apparently make one mean Chianti there.

When we finally reached our restaurant, I was not at all surprised to find it was located at the top of a hill. Which we could only reach by climbing up a rather steep set of stairs. And considering that this was going to be a bit of a boozefest, I wondered how some of us (not me, though, since I’m a teetotaler) were going to make it back down those stairs. To my jaded eyes, it looked like a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Before entering the restaurant itself, we were led to a small garden, with many many bottles of wine, giving the whole area a nice Chianti-fog. There was also some fruity sangria there...truthfully, the liquor kind of blended together after a while.

And I know I hadn’t had much to drink before entering the restaurant, despite being confronted by a huge stuffed moose immediately upon passing through the door to go inside.

This was a medium-sized restaurant, and truly a Tourists’ Restaurant, with a Singing Chef and everything. (And, since the chef was also the owner, he had plenty to sing about.) I don’t mean that in a bad way; it’s just that everybody in there was part of some packaged tour. The only locals there were the owners and employees. The other tour groups in there also seemed to be holding their end-of-tour parties. But there was something there that truly struck horror in me. There was a DJ. And a dance floor. This did not bode well.

The night didn’t start off with the DJ, though. Instead there was a small group of merry musicians consisting of a guy on a synth, a couple of guitarists, and a female singer.

I know I’ve mentioned before that the tour groups I saw (in addition to the one I was with) tended to be comprised of...mature folk. This point was really driven home when I realized that there were so many couples in the restaurant who were celebrating their 40th and 50th wedding anniversaries...and up. There was a couple there celebrating their 75th. Yes, there was a couple there celebrating their honeymoon, but it really was a night for the long haul marriages.

I can’t entirely recall how many people were sitting at our table, but there must have been at least 6 other couples. But, since we we were sitting at the table that was closest to the DJ’s crazy turntable, any conversation was was pretty much doomed to inaudibility by the singer and her back-up group. Not that that was going to stop any attempts at small talk. As near as I could tell, there was one other mother/child group traveling together.

Soon a communal fruit plate was placed on our table. Most of the fruit was recognizable, but there was...something...on there that nobody at our table could quite identify. It kind of reminded me of a peeled tomato, but much firmer. But as I had attacked the pineapple, and my eyes had rolled up with pleasure back into my skull, I couldn’t really tell what that fruit really looked like. It might have been a persimmon for all I know, but all I really know is the woman who daintily nibbled a piece of it didn’t really like it.

As we poked and prodded and munched at the fruit, our waiter came around to take our orders for our choice of meat dishes. There were the usual culprits of fish, chicken, or beef, but they’d put on their fancy Thursday night duds. Since a fish had frightened me as a child, I really only had a choice between the kickin’ chicken and the beef critter. A decadent wine and mushroom sauce caressed the beef, so there was no way I was about to pass that baby up.

Ah, but the meaty protein portion was only one of three promised entrées. The other two entrées were pasta dishes, including one huge stuffed noodle. I had had a teensy glass of Chianti before dinner but, remembering how sick I’d gotten after my last wine-soaked binge, I stayed with plain old fashioned water, much to the disbelief of the others at the table. (My Mom got the same kind of reaction. What can I say? Neither of us can handle the White Man’s Firewater very well.)

And then the part of the night I’d been fearing all along started. The DJ fired up the disco hits. “YMCA” showed up, as did the oodles of ABBA I'd been expecting. I was only slightly surprised to hear a vaguely-dance version of “Volare,” though.

While bodies gyrated and hip joints popped on the dance floor, our dinner plates were whisked away and our waiter came around offering glasses of limoncello. I had never heard of limoncello, but having missed out on the Venetian wine, I decided to give this a shot, since it sounded kind of fruity.

My God, I thought I was going to die. Strong is an understatement. My Mom tried a sip from my cup as well (since a sip is all I could handle of what I’d been poured); if you love your mother as much as I love mine, you never want to see her make such a face of disgust. Her tongue came out as far as Gene Simmons’s. I was told this limoncello was only 50 proof or something like that (I don’t know much about likker), and one of the men at our table told us he’d bought a bottle of limoncello earlier that day that was 90 proof (and, yes, he drank down all of his glass of limoncello in pretty much one gulp).

The burn of the limoncello had pretty much subsided by the time the thimbleful of espresso and slice of cake had arrived.

As the night drew to a close, we all managed to make it down the stairs from the restaurant to our tour bus without anybody falling down. (However, I did hear somebody from one of the other tour groups who said one of the men in their group had made his way down the stairs...and had continued weaving down the road, probably due to inertia.)

It turned out to be a rather balmy night. As I was well satisfied and well worn out by the very end of the night, notwithstanding the shock of the limoncello, I decided to throw caution to the wind and leave our hotel room’s window cracked open a little. This, in retrospect, was a mistake. A big mistake. And the reason for that is, as I learned the hard way the next day, Florentine mosquitoes feasted heartily upon my poor defenseless sleeping body that night. (Oddly enough, my Mom didn’t seem to be bothered by them, and her bed was closer to the window than mine was.)

Meaning my last day and a half in Italy would be very itchy ones....

(I have no photos for the night, blurry or otherwise.)