Siena

---

The hotel breakfast room is very quiet and everyone seems afraid to speak. I get into trouble from Issy for clanging my spoon against the rim of my cereal bowl too loudly (this also happens at home). One of the hotel staff puts on some music and this seems to ease the tension a bit.

This morning we've booked a private half day walking tour of the town of Siena which is about a 45 minute drive away. Our GPS seems to have mastered the art of sending us the wrong way and then calmly telling us to "turn around at the earliest opportunity". Just when we thought it couldn't get any worse it directs us into a dead end industrial estate after telling us to take the first exit at a roundabout; apparently roads into industrial estates don't count as exits from roundabouts in GPS world. I think it might be less infuriating if its voice wasn't so calm. The roads here all seem to be very narrow, even the main motorway. There are no shoulders or verges, and the forest comes right up to the edges of the traffic lanes. I'm concentrating hard. If I get distracted for even a fraction of a second I think there's a fair chance we'll run straight into a tree.

We meet our guide whose name is Costanza. First stop is the Basilica of San Domenica. Costanza tells us that this is also known as Basilica Cateriniana due to its close connection with Saint Catherine of Siena. She was a very prominent figure in Italy in the 1300s and is now one of the patron saints of both Italy and Europe. She started having visions at the age of six, and spent most of her time helping the poor and sick. She became very influential, and played a key role in getting the popes to move back to Rome from Avignon. She self-flagellated three times a day and fasted a lot, and as a result died at only 32. She was buried in Rome, but the people of Siena eventually convinced the Pope to cut her head and one of her fingers off and return them home, and they're now on display here in the Basilica. The head's in a painted bronze bust, but the finger just looks like an amputated finger which feels just a tad gruesome. They apparently parade the finger through Siena's streets on her feast day every year.

Next stop is the main Cathedral, which is next to a wall with a spectacular facade standing by itself. Costanza tells us that by the 1400s Siena's population had become very large, and as a result the Cathedral needed to be expanded. The lonely wall was going to be part of the enlarged structure, but before it was finished the plague hit and wiped out three quarters of the population. This meant that they didn't need a bigger Cathedral any more, but the wall was left there anyway.

The Cathedral dates back to the 1200s. Its facade is spectacular. Costanza says it was started by one architect, but he walked off the job after someone criticised him, and it was then finished by someone else. She tells us that if we look closely we can see the differences in the styles between the two designs. I pretend I can, but I think I might have been standing behind the door when they were handing out architectural appreciation. The interior is also spectacular. The columns are faced with black and white marble in horizontal stripes, and the floor is covered with mosaic panels depicting Biblical stories. Costanza says that we're lucky to be able to see the floor. It seems that they only uncover it for a couple of months a year, and the rest of the time it's under carpet. There's no shortage of artistic and sculptural masterpieces on display, including a few early Michelangelo figures.

We move on to the main square, the Piazza del Campo. Constanza tells us that this is the site of the annual horse races, or Palios, for which Siena is famous. They date back to medieval times, and the "modern" version has been held in its current format since 1656. Two Palios are held every year, one in early July and the other in mid-August, and are a competition between the city's 17 contrades, or wards. Only ten horses run in each race, and if your contrade doesn't get a run, it's guaranteed one in the next Palio. Professional jockeys ride the horses bareback. The whole thing's a bit of a lottery, because the horses are allocated to the contrades at random shortly before the start. The dirt covered course runs right around the outside of the square. Some of the bends look to be close to right angles with a simultaneous change of slope, and I'm not sure I'd want to be a jockey or a spectator, or a horse either for that matter. I wonder how crowded it gets in the local trauma ward on race days. On Palio days the centre of the square is packed with spectators who get in for free, but you have to pay for seats around the outside. There's no betting; the prize for the winning contrade is a silk banner, but bragging rights seem to be far more valued. Up until recently, one contrade hadn't won for more than forty years, and some residents feared they'd die without ever seeing a victory. .... and I thought people in Melbourne took their football seriously.

I haven't had my climbing ration for today, so I head for the Mangia Tower on the edge of the square. Issy declines. The stairway's steep, windy and extraordinarily narrow. It's so narrow that visitors aren't allowed to go up and down at the same time; fifteen minute blocks are allocated during which traffic's only allowed one way. In some of the tighter sections I need to turn my shoulders sideways to fit through. Some parts are also very low, and the top section is a series of steep wooden ladders. It's all worth it however. The views of the town and the surrounding countryside are spectacular.

We head back towards San Gimignano through a thunderstorm. Just when we thought it wasn't possible, the GPS' sense of direction deteriorates even further. It takes us down some village back streets to a dead end with a barrier across it and an impenetrable forest on the other side. Someone's put up a sign on the barrier in English saying "DO NOT follow GPS!!". I sense that maybe I'm not the first person to want to kill the inanimate object that's supposed to be guiding us. Its sense of direction doesn't improve from there. Issy calmly reminds me that yelling at it to "shut up" is not really all that productive. We had a long drive planned for tomorrow, but I'm beginning to think that we should probably cancel this in favour of something a bit less stressful.

We have dinner in an idyllic setting in the main square to the sound of a three piece band.

---

Comments

[Sam]

Think you going to have to buy a map and navigate the old fashioned way!