hollowsolid: GT-Five Roma-Firenze

Holy..

...Moly...

....Better Than Roscioli?

Travel day doesn’t quite cover this one. Forno Conti & Co for a cortado & pastry breakfast in the sun. Our last meal in Roma and our developing pre-verbal, point and drool skills ensured it was maximum-delicioso. That's 2 breakfast hits in a row (Roscioli's yesterday) compliments of ChatGPT. Quick walk back to the hotel, final pack and checkout and on the road / on the rails again. Dee = 4* HO

Forno Conti & Co

Ego tempted fate. Fate bit.

Grabbed a cab to the Roma Termini train station for this one, arriving in plenty of time for a bit of air conditioned stationery shopping. The airport parallels continue with several floors of air conditioned and dining shopping available to travellers.

Moleskine & Peanuts collaboration and we’re all in our element

Later, Firenze

We had the foreshadowing of a couple with a buggy being stopped by police requesting documents just in front of us as we sat waiting for our platform to be announced. That should have been my cue to gather my shit around me like a winter coat in a gale. People Get Ready. But I was comfortably brainscrambled. We boarded the train, nice pre-booked business class seats. Happy out. Guard remaining totally down.

The girls took the opportunity to polish their bracelets including the charms they’d purchased in Rome the night before. 1 stop at Roma Tiburtina before we hit Firenze. 4N in Firenze. Despite the perils of social media, fake news and doom scrolling, the phone has become the universal pacifier. Adults, kids, obnoxshes all seek and receive their own version of solace in public spaces, on public transport. Some obese male obnoxsh started snoring like a drain on a train across the aisle from us, the situation saved only by Public Enemy - Welcome To The Terrordome via M’s €20 Chinese earphones with great bass reflex. 10 fingerlifts of crisps work! Millefore and Coke as snacks on the train – LUGJURAY! The girls don’t know our Firenze hotel is a balancing of the Ferry/5Star ledger which we’d been overdrawn on.

Me and the terrible-horrible, no good, very bad day in Firenze. How to describe this shitshow of a day, this shit sandwich of a day? Where to even start? Possibly with the statement "Immaculate trip down on the train" That was before my trusty and beloved camera and lenses were lifted off the rack over our heads. Very likely at the second Roma station as we left the city of Rome [Roma Tiburtina]. I learned later that train stops in Italy are extremely high risk for items being stolen as thieves leave the train with your stuff. There’s also special breeds of asshole who board stopped trains, fly through astutely picking off unattended valuables, and your stuff plus the asshole are gone and impossible to apprehend before you’ve even figured out your stuff is gone. It was only when disembarking in Firenze that I noticed my camera bag wasn’t where I’d left it, on the roof rack over my head. Despite some initial anguished flapping, I knew immediately that my camera gear, collected over years, was gone gone. I said to M that rig would have done me for the rest of my life. Soul left my body. The girls later said we knew it was bad because you didn’t even get angry. "If i cud press rewind i wud, hold on, my heads on fire" Gutted, distraught doesn't begin to describe it. Initially at the loss of the thing but retrospectively at my own laxness and negligence to leave a window open wide enough to allow it to happen.

Transition from Gettin' Away With It to Gettin' Over It

I now have a decision on whether to replace these tools, this creative outlet which has brought me so much joy. Wandering with a camera is an activity so compatible with my personality and my compunction to move and get lost through places unfamiliar, documenting the minutiae I experience along the way. Tough to lose your tools, but the loss of the maybe 10000 photos I'd taken on the trip so far was the most emotionally galling thing for me. I scanned all travellers around our train and exiting the platforms, then re-boarded the train to scan all shelves and seats. I was aggressively kicked off by the attendant as the train was pulling out on its onward journey to Venice.

Abandoned Police Station At Firenze Station

Police telling me through a mirrored window and a locked door that the ‘report guy’ at the train station would be back in 2 hours.... An honourable, civic minded, available and useful policeman is a rare thing on this earth. Not sure if such a specimen even exists in Italy. I said screw that and made my way back to the girls to get tou our hotel and check in. Girls didn't know how I'd react. D said she knew it hit deep when I didn't even get angry.

Welcome To Firenze

We walked out of the train station to get a taxi. Got directed to a female taxi driver, loaded up our luggage, pulled out. Normally at this point I've got my phone out, very visibly tracking the route to avoid taxi driver shenanigans. Given I was still very much shell shocked, it took me a while, by which time she had twice headed away from the river and in to traffic, raising flags. So I pulled out my phone. Again she steered away from the shortest route on my phone. I said "hey, can we take the shortest route please?" First she responded with 'I know the address of your hotel'. That's not what I was flagging her on – and she knew it. So explicitly asked her again to take the shortest route, at which point she got immediately defensive, aggressively defensive, then visibly annoyed. She jammed on the brakes, told me she'd rather I fuck off. At this point we were 16 alleged euros into the fare and I said grand we'll get out but you get zero fare. She was disgusted, kept driving but ranting at me that I was the worst fare she's ever picked up. I said I’d had a bad day and asked her to just keep driving. She disclosed that she herself has been having a series of very VERY bad days and for that, if true, I empathised. But I had zero time for her blatant attempts to rip off harried touristicals. “Where you from. Where you from?” she kept asking me, assuming we were filthy, immoral American swine. “Yankee Go Home!” stickers were prominent on a lot of street signs in the town, so my sense is that Florence, like many over-touristed cities around the world, is sick of our touristical bullshit. "Doesn't matter where I'm from", I said. "Keep driving please". "Keep your eyes on the road please". Like a mantra, more to keep me from losing my shit than anything else. She then changed tack to ask me how long Maps told me the journey would take and that to prove she wasn't screwing us she’d get use there in the same time - or even less! I said I had no idea, that I was focused on watching the route.

Lungarno, Firenze

She now had the demeanour of someone who was caught red handed, called out when absolutely not expecting to be, having gotten away with it countless times previously. She started racing around the streets of Florence, narrowly avoiding schkelping a small touristical child, his mother pulling him out of the way just in time, all while telling me she was the safest driver. My my gut is screaming “nut job!”. Got to the nice hotel. It was central so no parking, no set down area, just pull up in the middle of the one way street while the traffic behind accumulates and waits. I got out to take the bags out – our crooked taxi driver did not offer to assist. Fine. She then dipped into the passenger side of the taxi, zeroed the meter and demanded 25 euro. I told her the meter was zeroed and I'd give her 20 max for the less than 10min ride from the station. This tipped her over the edge and she started full on screaming at me, I walked away after offering her 10 in cash over my shoulder. I no longer trusted her not to skim my card. Then she starts on M and the girls as a crowd gathered on the sidewalk. She (rather unfairly I thought!) asked M “How could you be with this asshole?” How can you be like this?” trying to guilt the girls into empathising. Pointing out the discrepancy between the nice hotel and trying to stiff a cabbie. Chants of “Shame, Shame” from one of the by now heavily invested bystanders. I was in the lobby at this point having walked away from her corruption and abject noise, expecting the girls to walk away aswell.

Egon Schiele Style Street Art, Firenze

Still hearing an ongoing commotion, I went back outside to rescue the girls, spotting what was going on as she's raving to the crowd in Italian as a Q of cars was forming behind her, blowing horns in the heavy afternoon heat. What a scene. The Frenzy of Firenze as it came to be known. Two hours of chaos on a boiling Tuesday afternoon. To counter her obvious abuse in cowardly Italian (which the girls could not respond to), I started shouting “Crooked Taxi Driver! Dishonest Taxi Driver!!” “Ripping Off Tourists!!” pointing at her. This freaked her out completely - defaming her very nature in front of the home support she’d gathered around her. The baggage concierge from our hotel joined the conversation, she explained her side, I explained mine. I basically told her to fuck herself 1 more time for good luck and asked her not to scam the next tourists she picked up and I left.

One Of The Bridges, Firenze

First impressions of Firenze definitely interesting. I was most disappointed with the first impression we made as a family in the nice hotel we were checking into. Rolling out of the cab chaotically and into the foyer like a Tasmanian Dust devil, being called the Infidel by a maniacal taxi driver. For all her efforts, nefarious and otherwise, she ended up getting zero for the fare. I did get €20 in cash and a healthy tip to the baggage guy the next day asking him to get the fare to the driver if he ever saw her again, but that I would not be seeking her out. Girls distraught, D crying because of the abuse M was shipping on my behalf. The empathetic hotel receptionist did not know what to make of me as I suspect the energy I was giving off at this point was some of the most manic, haywire, indecipherable energy she'd ever encountered.

Mirror Selfie & Dulux Dog

Our goodly auriga had picked the worst possible time to try and rip us off. I’m allergic to being ripped off on the best of days and I’d already had the heist of a lifetime perpetrated upon me so my tolerance for her hysteria and petty tourist exploitation was low. A comical picture, but what a fucking mess. Hours later, sipping cocktails on the quay the girls all complemented me for holding my shit together and not completely unloading on her. Maybe in a previous life I'd still be going at it with her on the street. When we checked in, M disappeared upstairs to the girls room to debrief, damage assess. I was contemplating texting them and telling them I'd meet the at the restaurant at 8pm as my gut was telling me they were ALL done with me for a while. Instead got the warmest reception from them when I met them in their room. I don't want the camera swipe to define the holiday. I told them 10 times out of 10 I would have the same interaction with any taxi driver obviously trying to rip us off so no apologies there. But the camera thing was a lesson for us and we all needed to move on. They absorbed it all well, and dealt with it very very maturely. To avoid my loss impacting the holiday I moved on surprising quickly too.

Auriga of Extortionate Navigation: "Swine!" Bile on Hellfire (2025)

Our first Arno crossing on foot over a stunningly picturesque medieval bridge on a quest for aperitivo as the sun set then on for dinner. Life is good, even when, immediately prior, it has been shit. Time + Space is a long long trip. Just yesterday we were camped out at Camper Barcelona. Then the ferry trauma which will live long in the collective memory. Summer buns had me a blast. Smoked sewage.

On The Way To Dinner

The plan for the lungs in Firenze before oxygen left us short? A couple of meal bookings, a couple of museums booked….. the rest? Chillato. Con Gelato? I was low key triggered over aperitivos by the tourist mating call of a Canon autofocus beep.

Starters

I had my concerns about pizza 2 nights in a row but this is fricken Italy eh?? And when they’re each one of the best pizzas we’ve ever had, for different reasons, such concerns are quickly put aside. Another amazing pizza at Giotto pizza. The crust a perfect blend of bite and fluffy goose down texture. The food came with a pizza scissors (a first for us) that looked like something you’d purchase in a religious supplies store, ornate, golden, shaped like oppression, a tool for a secret sacrament, or the remediation of a secret sin - the kind of implement you might see on display in the Vatican museum.

A collection of superlative pizza pies

A lovely evening walk home by the Cathedral and to bed. BOOM. Extreme hive gore ensued. Bad scene, honestly any worse and I'd been looking for an A&E. My whole body on fire. M administering anti histamines and hand held fans to cool me down. I blame an accumulation of the 3 day marinated black cod from Monday night in Rome, multiple coffees and pastries for breakfast, a deeply stressful fucking afternoon then some really bad food choices. All spilled my histamine reservoir the fuck over. Scary times. Tired but all good having spent a night in a very comfortable bed. Weirdly rested while remaining vaguely traumatised by it all.

At My Age, Manscaping Cannot Wait

Wed 6th
We’d been hearing on this trip about the death of the hotel buffet breakfast, where hotels worldwide are rethinking their approach to breakfast buffets to reduce food waste or meet sustainability goals. The beloved all-you-can-eat buffet often lead to excessive waste, generating more than twice as much waste as made-to-order meals. We had a delicious, healthful breakfast featuring portions of great decorum at the fantastically appointed hotel breakfast room which sits right on the Arno river. One particularly well appointed sit spot of 2 tables perched on a balcony sitting right out on the river has to be the best dining spot in the city. We’d get there early enough the next morning. We had 2 bookings for the day: The legendary Uffizi gallery - for the Cultures - and the no less legendary Osteria Vini e Vecchi Sappori (“Wines & Old Flavours Tavern”) for the vultures.

Post Traumatic Glitch. What IS Art Anyways?

The Uffizi is famous for its outstanding collections of ancient sculptures and paintings (from Middle Ages to Modern) and occupies the 1st & 2nd floors of a large building constructed 1560-1580. The collections of paintings from the 14th-century and Renaissance period include some absolute masterpieces: Giotto, Filippo Lippi, Botticelli, Mantegna, Correggio, Leonardo, Raffaello, Michelangelo and Caravaggio. The Gallery hosts an invaluable collection of ancient statues and busts from the Medici family, adorning the corridors throughout the museum. The long, sunlit corridors of the Uffizi present like enclosed decks providing shelter on a historical voyage of discovery through time and space. “Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and blood / When blackness was a virtue, the road was full of mud / I came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form / "Come in," she said, "I'll give ya shelter from the storm"

Overall the exhibits represent a mesmerising array of masterful depictions of humanity, deity, antiquity, vice, piety and holiness. My only mechanism to handle the overwhelming inputs was to make eye contact with the subjects of paintings as you pass to see which artists have succeeded in having their subject speak to you in an immediate, direct way across centuries and cultures. Problem is, in a room full of masterpieces, it's all of them. The artists like timeshare salesmen but instead of lakeside condos they’re selling time travel. At a certain point you need to just focus on what’s in front of you, put the fries in the bag and immerse yourself in the artwork, the colours the textures, the light, the shape of the frame, the story and try and make your own sense from it.

Art and Beauty don’t always have to make sense to move you like part of a wave. I spent the morning trying to learn to surf the waves of the Uffizi. “You can’t stop the waves but you can learn to surf” I’m definitely drawn towards darker art. Darker topics, palettes. Art that makes no sense but which is alive, which jumps off the fucking wall. Visiting and viewing art in person is a neat analogue to going to a gig to see a band play their hits in the flesh. A piece of art is a performance. A photo of a piece of art is not. You get zero sense of scale - the awe of scale is lost.

The way each piece of art featured in a world class collection has its own specific context and inspiration, its own mythology and back story which you could spend hours sifting through, building connections, and I will. Master artists were the mainstream media of their day, making today's museums the slowest TV since Sons & Daughters went off the air. Goya for example, possessing an unparalleled ability to represent the inner psychology of his subjects - in their faces, in their body language - making or breaking the legacies of smaller men several times a week. I wonder what he would have made of Trump.

These artists creating works of art that cement their own legacies for centuries. What is any artist in any medium doing today that compares to these regular, almost violent acts of creativity which have not only persistedm but enthralled across the ages? Mini BigBangs originating in multiple cities throughout Europe throughout the Renaissance, still acting as magnets to humans all over the world to bear witness. Art is the light and heat which keeps us from being alone in an endless wilderness.

Leda And The Swan - Francesgo Melzi (age15) Texaco Art Competition Finalist (1506)

Following the wavy gravy of the Uffizi we hiked 20mins across town in the afternoon heat to Coffee Mantra, a gorgeous local coffee roastery where there were cortados and iced lattes aplenty, to the soundtrack of Prince’s Kiss – the most effective use of minimalism in all of pop music.

Lenses Lost But I Still Have My Eyes

I had my first doppio, intense and uncontaminated by anything lactic, the addition of sugar to prevent my mind being blown straight off. We had an early dinner booked so after coffee we headed back to the hotel and I went on my first street photography shootout without my holster and gun. It did not yield any memorable results. Phone photos be so flat I miss the glass.

Street, Yo

Could Be A Carvaggio

Bought a beautiful spinning top, metallic brown & silver and full of physics at LiLa Toys, a desktop tchotchke for my upcoming adventures in Psychology.

Nods In Agreement

Really incredible authentic Italian evening at ristorante Vini e Vecchi Sapori. This one was the most epic of my many epic attempts to make a simple table reservation for an eating place in Italy. The place it took me maybe 15 attempts to book over the phone from home. Despite the questionable impression that might create, it turns out that the staff might just be shy, or have taken solemn vows of communication chastity, because in person they are tight, efficient, warm & friendly. Consummate hosts, some of them in the Strokes (ask D about that one).

A 20 seat place with a handwritten menu and a regular flow of hopeful, on-spec customers being turned away at the door, crestfallen, glancing back over their shoulders having failed even the first hurdle of the rite of passage to eat in the place.

I was worried that the more veggie leaning members of our party (S&I) might have to sit out a few courses here as some of the menus online (which change daily) had zero vegetarian fare (Florentine Tripe anyone?). Veggies had lucky lungs this night. When the mains arrived I felt sorry for S that her dish seemed to comprise only nutritionally bereft deep fried Zucchini flowers, so I was sharing the odd bit of my precious, precious ravioli with her. Turns out there was a full chicken spice bag thing going on with her dish and she lacked for no major food group at any point during the evening. She still freely accepted my precious handmade pasta parcels. I’m still thinking about that one.

"That Ravioli Is Boss! Why Is He Even Giving It Away Brah?"

It shouldn’t work at all and the photos show us huddled cheek to jowl around a small table, jampacked with glassware and beverages and dishes of food, right beside the serving station in a busy place with a low ceiling in very close proximity to neighbouring tables similarly populated. All of which would normally conspire to drive me nutsy, like Dustin Hoffman dressed as a Squirrel. But we’re smiling from ear to ear in all the photos, as it worked to perfection, one of the least fussy, most naturally warm, welcome and hospitable places I’ve ever eaten. There was a low key soundtrack through the meal, stacked with dad rock hits (and misses) as well as classic pop. We regularly descended helplessly into belly laughter any time one particularly tone deaf member of the Strokes attempted to sing along e.g. to ABBA’s Mamma Mia, the “My Mys” delivered with great gusto and a treacherous lack of musicality.

Flatfoot Fan Tooty sings "My My" in the back

Culinary highlight was my spicy tomato spaghetti - an incredibly simple and unfussy dish, executed to perfection. My potato ravioli in a rich and delicate pesto sauce was truly excellent. M's highlight was pappardelle in a duck ragu. The prosciutto and melon and the beef meatballs were by all accounts very good. The authentic Italian food experience delivered by a cultured, friendly, unfussy and helpful staff - all male interestingly – was a huge culinary highlight of many on this trip. I wore my tasteless floral Hawaiian shirt because it was cleanest, and I look like the obnoxious American capitalist antichrist our taxi driver was willing me to be. Despite this, I was still treated with compassion and kindness by the staff.

The “Biscuits & Wine” were a big hit for dessert, crispy nutty biscotti dipped in a deceitfully strong sweet wine. Hommena. Definitely worth getting hung up on multiple times immediately after I’d said “Hello” on the phone. Again, I’m going to put it down to shyness. “I bargained for salvation, and she gave me a lethal dose”

We wandered, sauntered, perambulated then flaneur’d through the city where in one of the squares there was a large Belgian Orchestra kicking out the classical jams for the weary, bloated flaneurs.

Half Cut Craic On The Square

D, admittedly half cut on fine wine, stopped in to sample the world’s most expensive Pick 'n' Mix: “Captain Candy”, delivering herself a €19 treat. She subsequently expressed regret and recognised her spend thriftiness while inebriated. Good for her to know