- Orvieto and arrival in Florence

Since we leave Roma today, its time to reflect a litte. Aviva said at one point that Rome is beautiful but messy, which captures well the feeling of the place. At one point on Capitoline hill (it was 11:30A), all the bells in Roma seemed to be chiming at once, making a wonderful racket. Its been warm here, in the 80s F I'd guess, and so I've been sweating a lot. Lots of sun, which is nice for the outlook but quite warm when walking around. And its soooo poluted; guess they should use that same gasoline / ethanol / ether mix we use in Chicago.

The train ticket to Orvieto from Rome

We took an hour train ride to Orvieto. Its a real hill town - you take a funicular up to the town from the train. This funicular is a cable train that goes up the hill at probably 30 - 40 degrees, They pack the car full of people.

Ticket for the funicular

We dropped our bags at Hotel Duomo and then had lunch at a nice restaurant to the left of the Duomo.

Card for the Hotel Duomo - looks like a nice place and the people were very helpful

We shopped a little and then went inside the Duomo of Orvieto. The facade is one of the most interesting I've seen with lots of carvings near street level and paintings further up.

Views of the paintings on the facade of the Duomo
Detail of the two side doors	The main entry door
Views of the carvings at street level on the facade

Inside it was very plain at the front, but the alter and two chapels at the back were amazing. The altar is frescoed from floor to ceiling on both sides and the back.

The ceiling above the altar

The altar of the Duomo

Inside view of the entrance - its quite a tall building!	A frescoe on a wall inside the Duomo
"Ritratto del Poeta Virgilio" by Signorelli	"Ritratto di Dante" by Signorelli
"The Damned" by Signorelli
A detail from "The Damned"
"Stories of the Antichrist" by Signorelli
Detail from "Stories of the Antichrist" showing Signorelli's self portrait next to Fra Angelico	Detail from "The Resurrection" by Signorelli
The mosaic street outside the Duomo

We then visited the museum for the Duomo, which was small but nice.

The facade of the museum - its behind the Duomo and up the stairs

A Madonna and Child from the museum

We shopped a little more; I found a multi-card digital photo reader, something not available in central Rome (I guess all the Luddites live in Rome then).

We got on a train and spent two more hours getting to Florence. We checked into our hotel, Hotel Calzaiuoli, which we like a lot. But, we have a room on the street and so we're changing in the morning for one in back - the streets of Florence are noisy. Dinner at a fast cheap place (fast-food Italian), then back to clean up and crash.

Train ticket from Orvieto to Florence

Mounted police ouside our hotel