Florence, Italy: The Uffizi Gallery

Mom and I got up early to try and beat the line to see the Uffizi Gallery, which is rated as the best museum in Italy.  We still had to wait in a line, but only for 45 minutes--much better than the 2-3 hour wait that happened later in the day!  Does it live up to the hype, you may ask?  Absolutely; it took us six hours with no stops or food to see all of what the museum had to offer.  The artwork was phenomenal.  Since you can't take pictures inside the museum, I've included the shot above, which is the view of Florence's west bank from the second floor of the gallery.

After our six-hour journey through the Uffizi, all we wanted to do was sit down.  Unfortunately, we got lost on the way back to our hostel, but we did manage to find this beautiful church, San Croce, where Michaelangelo and Dante are buried, among others.  That combined with a quick gelato stop made getting lost not so bad at all!