Ellen's Visit

Ellen

This is going to be a short post, because we had so much fun during our visit from Ellen Bonnell that Carmen did not take many pictures.  Ellen is an Action Ski Club member and the alpha female in Carmen's and her book club.  A business analytics professional, she was also instrumental in getting me my teaching gig at UCSD Extension after I "retired".  Ellen is currently working on a Master's degree in supply chain management in Dublin, Ireland, and she decided to pop over here for a quick weekend visit.

We took the train into Florence on Saturday morning to hook up with her, and then found a wonderful Trattoria on a small side street to have lunch.  We brought her back to our place, spent a relaxing evening with great wine and even greater conversation, and made plans to see the Picasso exhibit on Sunday.  We know Ellen relaxed because she slept in until ten the next morning;-)

We made up for our slightly late start by driving into Florence without getting lost--the first time we have accomplished that!  The Picasso exhibit was great, the girls did some shopping, and then we said "arrivederci" at the train station.  Here are a few pictures from walking around Florence: 

Entrance to the Old City Center

Duomo and Bell Tower

A closer look at features of the Duomo and Tower

Finally, to keep you up-to-date on our activities, we are going on a cruise from Venice to Greece on Monday (that's Nov. 24), returning the following Monday.  We will not be answering our land line (obviously), but the boat has wi-fi (I expect it to have better bandwidth than our place here), so look for our next post from the Aegean Sea!