Apartment in the Oltrarno

It's Friday evening as I write, and we've been on the ground in Italy since about this time on Wednesday. That is not to say that our brains made the transition that soon--that happened perhaps around lunchtime today. Despite melatonin and exercise and positive thinking, jet lag remains an issue. I'm hoping that all of us will sleep well tonight and we'll be able to consider that we've adjusted. Last night none of us slept well, at different times.

There are three of us here: Steve and I invited our daughter Juliet to join us in Florence when it turned out that the VRBO.com rental apartment that we settled on had room for more than the two of us. It's in the Oltrarno area south of the Arno, where we have now stayed four out of the five times we've visited Florence in this series of European sojourns, now entering its tenth year.

The apartment, like all the apartments we've rented in this way, has its good points and its less good points. This one has a recently modernized kitchen and bathrooms (two), with recently tiled floors. There are some charming ceiling frescos, and the furniture includes some nice antique sideboards, dining table and chairs, and armoires. The rooms are large and light, on the fourth (U.S.) floor, which provides a lovely rooftop view out over the city--including a bit of the top of the Duomo's dome and the bell tower--and is reached by an elevator that compares well in size and efficiency with others in our experience.

On the other hand--and this is not a complaint, just an observation--the tiled floors risk being slippery, and the nice new bathrooms with tiles all the way up the walls have no shelves or other places for toiletries to be stored or displayed. The kitchen is sparsely equipped with many plates in two sizes of both of the two different patterns but only one small bowl suitable for yogurt or soup, three coffee cups, and no dishtowels. By contrast, there is an abundance of plastic roses. It is so interesting to see what other people consider to be requirements of comfortable living.