Energizing in Padua

Padua University*Anatomy Lab*Botanical Gardens*Saint Anthony's Basilica

8 miles

I didn't know much about Padua, but I like this place!  It's a University town.  Padua University has a student population of 65,000.  It is the second oldest University in Italy, founded in the early 1200s.  Galileo taught here.  The highlight of our day was touring a couple of the old rooms of the University, including the first Anatomy Theatre built in the 1500s.  This is a small 4-tiered circular theatre where the students stood above and the professor dissected a body below.  After Law, Medicine is the oldest faculty at this University.  We also saw the podium that Galileo lectured from.  Also, the first woman every to graduate from college went to this University.  Maren's decided if she could learn Italian, she could study here.

We saw several graduates celebrating with their families wearing laurel wreathes and leis.

We also enjoyed an amazing fruit and vegetable market this morning.  Too bad we are staying in a hotel and I don't have a kitchen to cook in.  We bought several different kinds of fruits to eat with our cream brioche, including tiny strawberries - about the size of a large blueberry.

Padua is small and we returned to our apartment twice to relax, play cards, catch up on our social media and take it easy.  We even had time to watch Mrs. Doubtfire tonight (well, just half, because we are going to bed early since we have a long day in Venice tomorrow).

We also visited the Basilica of St. Anthony which is different than most churches we have seen - more Byzantine with a golden angel statue on top (it kept reminding us of the Angel Moroni on our temples, except with wings).  Inside were relics of St. Anthony including his tongue, vocal chords, and lower jaw.  These things just creep my kids out.

Our afternoon was spent relaxing and wandering a beautiful botanical garden that would rival Red Butte.  It was peaceful - we had a lunch picnic of Calzone and Fanta and played cards on the grass - Bang.  An Italian western game (think western themed cards with Italian names and instructions) - we love it!  (Emma had my camera and I have about 200 pictures of plants and flowers now).

Dinner was another picnic at a huge piazza/park where we attempted to back hacky-sac, but just made fools of ourselves instead!

Saint Anthony's Basilica

Bang card game at the botanical gardnes

Florence to Padua

Medici Chapel*Lauretian Library*Ferrari Museum*Scrovegni Chapel

15,548 steps

Today we made the short 2:45 minute drive from Florence to Padua.  We took our time leaving Florence visiting the Medici Library and sat at a cafe eating a very gooey chocolate croissant.  We then hauled our luggage the 25 minute walk to the parking garage and gratefully our car was still there and undamaged.

We made a 1 hour stop in Maranella - the home of Ferrari and visited the Ferrari museum.  I didn't think I could be enticed by such a fancy car, but wow - I might just be able to drive a Ferrari around town!  The entire museum smelled like new car smell - there were Ferraris dating from the 1950s, cars that raced, one of a kind cars, and luxury cars you might see driving around Hollywood California.  It was a nice break from looking at art.  Charlie was in heaven and when we went to the gift shop and there was a Lego Ferrari, he just couldn't resist purchasing it.

We arrived in Padua by 5:30 (just in time for Maren to skype in on Senior Class Officer meeting - (the joys of modern technology!).  Padua is quiet, sleepy, and smaller than Florence and not a tourist in site!  We are staying in our first Hotel - a family room with 5 twin beds (2 pushed together to make a "master bed"). At the moment Charlie is sleeping on the crack of the "master bed" and Sydney is enjoying her first bed without Charlie next to her.  I'm not sure who's going to get kicked out of the master bed first, me or Charlie - Sydney might just find one of us in her bed come morning.

Tonight we visited the Scrovegni Chapel - a chapel painted in frescoes entirely by Giotto.  It has a brilliantly blue ceiling with white stars.  Around the walls are stories from the Savior's life.  We had a fun time figuring out the scenes.  Before entering the chapel we had to sit in a room to dehumidify for 15 minutes.  Emma thought the oxegyn was being sucked out and complained that she was getting faint because all the water was being removed from the room - funny girl!

Dinner was a HAMBURGER!  We found a great Italian hamburger joint that would rival Smashburger (or we've just eaten too much pasta in the last 18 days).  This is a student town with one of the oldes Universities in Italy (1200s), Galileo was a prof here and Copernicus was a student.  Cheap eats are abundant!

Oh - I should add, Emma, Sydney, and Charlie all wore their soccer jerseys today that they bought in Florence. We have teams Barcelona, Madrid and Chelsea - we were stopped a couple of times by Italians who wondered how we could pledge allegiance to so many different teams.  A huge European cup soccer tournament is going on right now, and soccer is on everyone's mind.

Scrovegni Chapel

Scrovegni Chapel