OtoArno Street Party, Florence

On Saturday, my last night in Florence my first tour guide, Andrea, called me to go out. Thank goodness since if I had to do one more activity on my own I was going to scream. Plus she's super cool and we've kept in touch since. It turned out to be a great night. It was similar to Nurnberg's blau nacht, but obviously much cooler, called NottArno "Notte Bianca in OltrArno." Basically all there were a ton of stalls and booth set up selling food, vintage clothing, snacks, etc. All the restaurants brought tables into the street, so you could sit and eat in the road while bands played in the street too. There were also various exhibits to see art - dance, music, and artwork.

Here is a parade that went by the restaurant we were sitting at. The wife of this place's owner is German. The first of about 100 people in this city who preferred to speak to me in Deutsch than English.

View from where we were sitting down the road.

A great band was playing just a few doors down from where we ate. You'll see them throughout the below since we kept dancing in the street here.

Then we walked around to see the other exhibits.

Here are fire dancers....

Cirq de Sole type artist. Super cool. How to install this type of thing in my apartment, hmmm..

She was teaching people from the crowd how to do it.

The hippie band w/ no shoes and Mohican tribal hair cuts.

At what is a youth hostile in the summer and a homeless shelter in the winter, they had an art showing. Here is the amazing cieling.

Part of my job includes photographing people on the street for current 'trends' here is one such shot. Super cool, cute and nice couple.

Here I am with Heather (tour guide to see the David, American) and Andrea (1st tour guide from the evening tour who invited me out, Australian)

The crowd gathered at the band from earlier. In the back right corner you can see the Dangerous Work shop. Met the owner - basically it's a 'hipster' type store where he takes old tees, feed bags, etc with graphics and turns them into new apparel. The window display looks like a bunch of rags on a mannequin, but there are cooler more wearable pieces inside.

This was on the wall inside Dangerous Work. Proof that odd things cannot only be found in Germany.

Lauren DeBlasio - it must be a Florence curse! Dancing w/ old men. Ha.

Wanted to take a pic of these guys for the trend presentation I had to do, but they made me be in it as well. Where are they from, hmm, why Germany of course.

Andrea and her Italian husband, Beppe, whom she met on her first day in vacation in Florence a few years ago, and like the other tour guides, have just never left. (disclaimer, she did go back and fourth to Australia, but you get the point)

Another trend shot and me getting dragged into it again.

Massimo, my new italian friend who speaks no English, but again Deutsch, and Espanol e Italiano.

She made this hat herself.

Massimo and his friends took me to the same event, but over in Piazza Santo Spirito. This neighborhood was more like a college frat party. Super young crowd going a bit crazy.

Here is the Santo Spirito church which they used for a light show.

Even Sponge Bob came out for the party.

On Sunday morning, before I drove back to Nurnberg, I snuck in the Galileo exhibit at the Palazzo Strozzi.

Then I drove the 7.5 hrs back home. Here are pics from super north Italy, just before the Austrian boarder. Just before this pics are taken I had to to a 40min rest stop nap. Way too exhausted from being out to late on Sat.