Italia Uno

Italy will be too big for one post, so here's part one.

Our journey begins at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Here's Jac in the courtyard between the wings of the gallery.
Here's the Ponte Vecchio, Florence's only bridge to survive WWII unscathed. It dates from the 15th century.
The infamous Medici family ran Florence for centuries. Their offices were in the current Uffizi gallery (Uffizi literally means "offices") but they lived on the other side of the river. After an assassination attempt, they got paranoid and built a covered walkway from home to over the Ponte Vecchio and ending at the Uffizi (where this picture is taken from) so that they'd be safer. Nice to know paranoia isn't a modern invention...
We stopped in the hill town of Orvieto en route to Rome. It had some spectacular views from its walls into the valley below.
You get used to seeing parking like this in Rome. This picture doesn't do one thing justice though: there's usually a lot more scooters around.
Here's a panorama from the top of St. Peter's Basilica overlooking the Vatican and Rome. It's still hard to believe that we were actually there. Click on the picture: it's a bit bigger for more clarity.
Here's another panorama of the Pantheon in Rome. I would be amiss if I didn't inform you that the panorama process has made the space seem much smaller than it actually is. This place was simply breathtaking. It was built around 2000 years ago and it took nearly 1500 years before a comparable dome was built.
Here's Jac standing under the Pantheon's oculus. (that's architecture-speak for "hole in the ceiling")

Well, there's the first bit of Italy. Hopefully there will be less time between the last update and this. Thanks go to Karin for reminding my lazy ass to do this.