I believe the last "day" I wrote about was day 4 of our trip...the last day we spent sight-seeing in Rome. Day 5 was spent in Siena, which is a little town in the Tuscany countryside. When we began planning the trip, we thought it was a good idea to give ourselves a little "break" from the hustle and bustle of the busier cities, and we decided that Siena would be a great break.
I have always wanted to see Italy's Tuscany...all the flowers, rich colors, enjoying a great glass of wine, and the simple lifestyle sounds like serenity to me!
The four of us ended up deciding to book 2 rooms for this night's stay, instead of having all 4 of us share a room. And, the place we stayed was definitely one of the best of accommodations we had so far (we actually had access to a washer and dryer!) At this point, we were all ready to have a wonderful night's rest. However, that wasn't in the cards for Derrick & I. Let me explain...we stayed in the "Old City" part of Siena. There are no cars or buses or trains in this section of the city; all that's allowed is walking, and motorized scooters. This part of the city is also where a university is located, so there are handfuls of college students who occupy these quarters. And, the buildings are built tall, and close together...which means that the sounds that whatever or whoever is traveling through the alleyways echo. Needless to say, the combination of these conditions, paired with the lack of insulation in the walls, and the lack of glass in the windows (there were just shutters that you would open or shut to keep the weather/light/next-door-neighbors out) made for quite a noisy night! It didn't end up being the peaceful night Derrick & I were anxiously anticipating!
Oh, well...who needs sleep, anyway? We woke up the next morning, and fueled up with some breakfast. We enjoyed our breakfast overlooking the Il Campo, which was the large "courtyard" in the middle of the city...which was a perfect spot to people watch!
After breakfast, we went to the tower that overlooked the Il Campo, and began to climb the many circling steps to the top so Steve could get "the best view". The stairway to the top of the tower definitely was not something a claustrophobic person would want to do. There was only enough room for one person to pass through at a time. When we would run into someone who was going the opposite way we were, someone would have to stop and stand in one of the corners so the other could squeeze by and continue on their way. And, I found that I myself would have to give my eyes a break every now-and-then, or else I'd begin to feel a little dizzy. And, I definitely didn't want to look down the center, cuz you could see all the way down. The picture below of the steps is the view you would see if you would have looked down the center. I'm pretty sure I just stuck the camera over the edge to get the shot! But, once we got to the top, it was totally worth the climb!
Before heading on to Florence later in the afternoon, we made our way to the outskirts of the city to a place where we could enjoy the countryside.
One memory I forgot to share about our train ride from Rome to Siena...we were in such a hurry making sure we caught all the right trains so we could be on our way out of Rome, we pushed aside the idea to eat something. So, once we were all settled on our set train that would take us to Siena, we all realized we were kinda hungry. However, all we had was a cake-like thing we had bought a couple days earlier in Rome. The problem was, we didn't think to take along any silverware. So, Steve asked the people we were sharing the train car with if they had any, but we didn't have any luck. So, Steve took out his wallet, and found the thing that would have to do: his insurance card.
It must have been quite a sight seeing the four of us passing around a cake and eating it with the only utensil we had!
