Last evening I went for a stroll through the back streets on the south side (Santo Spirito) of the Arno to find a place to eat. It is pretty much like the city side with just as many Piazzas and 'significant' buildings. Found a place which I had passed by earlier and ordered Bruschetta followed by Tagliatelle con sugo al Cinghiale - Tagliatelle with wild boar sauce. Very nice. All washed down with Vino Casa mezzo lotto Rosso (1/2 liter of house red).
Had a curious fantasy as I was dining. I had selected a seat facing the door which gave me a wedge of vision of perhaps 1.5 meters on this side of the street extending to maybe 7 meters on the far side of the street. I imagined a reality where people walking past, and vehicles,
did not actually exist until they came into my vision and disappeared from reality as soon as they left my sphere of vision. People who stopped to look at the menu outside temporarily entered the reality zone but if they decided not to eat at the restaurant then they disappeared in a pouf also. The world, from that perspective was a rhomboid 1.5 meters across at the. Earnest and 7 meters across at the furthest. Of course the restaurant was entirely within the reality zone. It was an interesting fantasy, possibly fueled by the house red, but it highlighted how our vision of the world can be severely limited by our view port.
The pickup for my tour arrived promptly and then, after a couple more pickups, dropped us at the Railway Station to register and await the bus. A full load of 52 set off for San Gimignano along with Brando, our tour leader. The ride to SG was pleasant enough with a bit of historical info from Brando as we were leaving Florence and more as we approached SG which is on one of the highest hilltops in Tuscany. Along the way we passed through the Chianti region which has hilly countryside with lots of trees interspersed with vineyards, olive groves and the odd field of what looked like grass for hay. Also, particularly around villas, there are the ubiquitous symbol of Tuscany - Cypress trees.
San Gimignano (apparently) once had something like 72 towers so was known as the city of towers - although city is stretching it a bit. Now there are only 12 or 16 (or some number in between) depending on who is counting and what is included as a tower. Be that as it may, it is a place caught in a time warp as there have been no new buildings there for hundreds of years. There has been some construction by addition to existing buildings but it is minimal. Of course the whole place exists as a tourist trap all though some people obviously live there who are not directly associated with the tourist industry.
I had included entry to the Torre Grossa (big tower) as part of the tour package so duly went and climbed up to the top. The lower part is all medieval steps which are about 1.25 times the height of steps today, but the upper half is all modern steps constructed of steel and much easier to climb. The view from the top, in all directions, was great with expansive views over the Tuscan countryside.
After San Gimigniano we were taken to a winery for lunch and wine tasting with commentary etc from a very entertaining daughter of the family. Of course the whole thing was designed to get people to buy wine and or olive oil from them. However the food was good, if not copious, consisting of an antipasto late of Bruschetta, bread with extra-virgin olive oil, cheese and three types of salami. This was accompanied by a white Chianti followed by a normal Chianti Rosso. The main course was penne in a tomato sauce drizzled with truffle olive oil and was tasty. This was accompanied by a Chianti Classico which again went down very well.
After lunch we headed for Siena where we were put into the hands of a young female tour guide who took us around and gave a running commentary on the Audi devices that we had been issued with. Unfortunately, I had trouble in hearing exactly what she was saying so I resolved to go back over it all at a later stage and fill in the blanks. We did finish that part in the Duomo (cathedral) which I had included in the package and most people on the bus did likewise. After the Duomo, Brando and I went off for a tour of the Museo Civico which has a number of rooms preserved which illustrate the history of governance in Siena. The main frescoes were, apparently, painted by one of the first 'lay' artists of the time and showed a fascinating slice of political, and ordinary, life in Siena. The Museo Civico is one of the major buildings on 'il Campo' (the field, which it is not - it is a paved square where they run an biennial horse race - the Palio - between ten of the seventeen districts of Siena.
After all that it was time to assemble in il Campo when it started to rain lightly. As we started back towards the bus it was still raining lightly as we stopped at a Gelateria for an ice cream, and then pelted down for a while. It eased off again just before we continued our walk back to the bus so nobody got too wet.
After Siena it was back to Florence but with a stop at Monteriggioni which is the fortress where Dante was imprisoned for a couple of years and where he wrote The Divine Comedy. There is not a lot there except the obligatory Ristorante/Pizzerias and a few touristy shops, but it was an interesting short stop anyway.
The rest of the ride back to Florence was uneventful but the state of the road between Siena and Florence is abysmal with many sections where two lanes are reduced to one and some where two lanes each way are reduced to one each ways due to works going on. And the surface on the open lanes is pretty broken up in places too. I'd say that road maintenance has not been high on the agenda for a while. At the same time there are new works going on - it looks like widening some sections is being done - so who knows?
I had arranged for them to drop me off at my hotel at the end of the tour but when we got to the Railway Station no ride was in sight. Fortunately, I was able to prove that I had booked it and after a phone call and a 30 minute wait I was duly driven back to my hostel by a very obliging and apologetic young guy named Mauro. It turned out he had just returned from three months in Aus which he thoroughly enjoyed. And so back to the hotel by 8:30pm. A longish day but quite satisfying over all.
