Yes, yes, they did say that it would be hot in Florence.
But nobody said this hot.
(Alla Dreyvitser TWP/twp, phto by bigstock) - Michelangelo's David, Florence.
This, I think as I navigate the 463 steps you must climb to explore the mammoth cupola crowning the city’s famous Duomo, is not just heat. This is an inferno, a body-melting ordeal: Look at the streams of sweat pouring down my face and neck. And I’m going down the stairs, not up.
It’s half-past noon, the sun is high in the Tuscan sky, and the temperature is 98 degrees — and climbing. Such has been our weather here, day in, day out. Clear heavens, broiling orb. Record-setting August temperatures — 99, 100, 101. And more.
The day we visit Siena, we’re lucky: It’s only 100 there, higher up in the hills, while Florence withers at 104 degrees. “Very unusual for us here,” says the hostess at the restaurant where we eat back in town that night. Just our luck.
And speaking of night. It’s cooler in the evenings, they say? Hah! In the apartment where we’ve been invited to stay (free digs! who could refuse?), the air’s stifling. We throw the windows and shutters open wide before bed, praying for a breath of breeze — and get whomped with mosquitoes instead. I wake in the morning with bumps on my back and my hair so wet you’d think I’d been running through a rainstorm. (I wish.)
Perhaps you wonder: Is there no air-conditioning in the apartment? Hah again. This is Italy! Where there is not very much air-conditioning at all. Yes, some restaurants are cooled — barely — and some shops, but given my husband’s anti-purchasing proclivities, we can only peruse the purses and wallets for so long. In the museums, portable air-conditioners labor to overcome the effects of hundreds of sweaty bodies passing through. Guess what? Can’t be done.
There is, in a word, no relief!
Until we come up with the five-star cocktail hour.
I don’t recall whose idea it is, if anybody’s. I think it just happens because my husband wants a drink. And because he puts on long pants.
That’s so he’ll look decent (he’s from the South) going into the bar of the small hotel next door to our apartment. We sit ourselves down in the funky oversized chairs, but the bartender’s busy on his cellphone. Outdoors. We wait. And wait. And — we start to sweat a little. Not because my husband’s anxious to order, which he always is. But because the hotel’s cooling system blows . . . uh, not exactly cold air.
“It’s too hot in here,” complains Anson, tugging at his trousers. “Let’s go someplace else.”
But where? “I think,” says my friend Judy, pondering, “that we’d have to go to a five-star hotel for really good air-conditioning.”
Of course! A luxury hotel can’t let its patrons roast! It will cool them commensurately with every penny they pay!
“Let’s go to the Hotel Savoy,” I exclaim, remembering the ritzy-looking establishment we’d admired while sitting in the piazza earlier. After all, we’re dressed up! We have credit cards! We can afford just drinks!
So off we traipse. “Buona sera, signora!” call out the desk clerks as we enter the Savoy lobby. Everybody’s so welcoming! In the elegantly plush modern bar, the waiters hop to and we’re soon basking in climatic comfort. We raise our martini glasses in a toast to our smarts, then sip the drinks verrrrry slooooowly as the sweat evaporates from our skin. The waiter brings a tray of treats — mini-crostini, olives, cheeses — for us to munch on. And a second when we finish that one. We relax. We feel very cool. In every sense. This is the life!
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