A TALE OF TWO CATHEDRALS

Over the last two days we have visited two major cathedrals ... Or Duomos as they are called over here.

Sienna on Tuesday and Florence today ( Wednesday ).

Now I have to tell you when we parked the car and saw how far we had to climb to actually get up to the cathedral in Sienna I almost had a fit.

It is a VERY long way up and I was VERY apprehensive but we set off regardless and then we came to these.....

Modern inventions to the rescue.

One after another, activated by a motion sensor as you stepped on them they went upwards, ever upwards. There must have been six at least.

They finally came out in a narrow street bordered on both sides by very high, very old buildings.

Very stark, quite dingy, not impressive.

We walked on and finally turned a corner to see this !

Absolutely beautiful .... from any angle.

Inside was a-maz-ing !! ( paid entry )

Everywhere you looked there was some wonder to see. 

Amazing floors

And ceilings

Wonderful paintings

Stained glass windows

And the dome !

The carvings were incredible.

Can you see all these heads around the window?

When I started to look they were everywhere.

And just when you thought you had seen it all we stepped into this room

And were completely blown away.

So today we set off to Florence looking forward to the great Florence Cathedral.

This time we caught the bus and, thank Heavens, Florence is Flat !

Much bigger city, much bigger crowd,

Much Bigger Cathedral.

( Sorry about the solar flare !)

Too big to fit into one photo

So pretty - all pnk and green and white.

With great anticipation we hurried inside. (Free entry)

A huge cavernous building but quite bare.

Beautiful floors,

Spectacular dome

So there you are.

Each one beautiful in its own way

But I think my favourite was Sienna's.

Cheers