Spring 2014 in Florence

Of all seasons, my favorite is spring! I really hoped to be able to experience another splendid spring here in Florence and Tuscan region. As always I was so happy when I saw all those trees started to blossom. Last year was amazing, for the first time in my life I saw all these beautiful flowers from tulips to daffodils and beautiful blossoms of cherry, apple, apricot, peach and grapes. 

Spring this year was still beautiful but for rather a shorter period of time! Too short! I remembered I began to see some trees alongside of the street showed their blossoms. The blossoms were still too tiny, I thought, I would come back in couple days to take some photos of them. Today I went back there they became slightly bigger but some petals have fallen off and new leaves have come out. As I took some photos today, I felt a bit disappointed to find more leaves and very few blossoms. Spring this year is not as splendid as last year. 

This phenomenon was also happened in autumn. We had a very nice not too hot nor too humid summer in Florence compared to last year. It was still warm until beginning of October. I noticed how all trees in some parks nearby were still had their green leaves as if it was not yet fall. The temperature dropped and got much colder with clouds and rains around the 2nd week of October and the trees seemed confuse with this drastic change. Some leaves turned directly into brown without turning reddish first and fell off. Some leaves turned yellow for a short while then also fell off. As if they just realized that they were too late to let all their leaves off. Hence, there was much less colorful autumn this year!

It's an evidence of global climate change. Apparently temperature this year is too warm for spring as well as it was too cold for autumn. In effect, the trees seemed confused and tried to keep up with rapid changes.

However, although autumn this year not as colorful and spring this year not as splendid as last year,  Florence remains beautiful, interesting and unique to me. Despite all the limitation, complication, disappointment and frustration, it remains a fabulous Florence.

   ~O.K.