Buona Pasqua

By luck we have arrived in Florence just in time for Easter, which is a huge event in Italy.

We wandered down to the Piazza Duomo to watch the procession and subsequent lo scoppio del carro a Firenze, a cart with fireworks that goes off in spectacular fashion. This tradition dates back to 1099 when a Florentine raised the Crusader's standard on the walls of Jerusalem and was rewarded with three flints from the Holy Sepulchre.

In any case, the crowd was enormous with people obviously having traveled from far and wide (mostly from England and the US, unfortunately) so getting to the front proved impossible, but it was very exciting nonetheless.

Afterwards we celebrated with traditional Italian Easter food, Dove Cake and Dove biscuits and, of course, Easter eggs.

There are some more photos from the event here.