Full moon in Siena

Marble parquetry in Siena Cathedral

Amazing library

Where the Pailo is run

Panorama of Siena

From the museum looking at cathedral

Blogging in Siena in new Tshirt

Siena is an ancient town steeped in history, today we start with a walking tour from the tourist office. Chiara our guide starts us off in the middle of the Piazza de Campo the place where the Palio a horse race is run twice a year. This horse race is a big deal in Siena and each year 20,000 people squish into the centre of the Piazza where we stand for the mad 75 second rush by the horses and their jockeys around the track. The jockeys do not use saddles and if they fall off the horse and still run without them. [Video of Palio].

Each horse represents a contrada and Chiara now takes us away to a quite back lane to explain what contrada is using amazing facial expressions and big hand movements. Basically anyone who lives in the old city can belong to one of the 19 contradas, they represent districts but are much more than that in passionate Italian life and have been around since the middle ages. A contrada looks after all the people and is a Chiara was born into she wolf, which of course is the best Contrada unfortunalty they have not one the Palio for the last 24 years so she is a bit upset about that. Her son is of a different contrada, the snake and she explains she loves him is all aspects except the Pailo.

We move onto fantastic views of Siena we had not found yesterday, we also find out that any of the bad drivers must come from Florence. Now the piece de resitance the Siena Cathedral. Outside the church is impressive, inside it is even better. Again it’s a mix of Romanesq and gothic styles, but so much more. We see St John the Baptist’s arm, however there are suppose to be 7 of his arms around Euorpe she explains in a very funny Italian way.

Two of my favorite bits are the marble inlay floor with intricate details and amazing scenes. This church has 56 scenes on the floor using this technique. The only other two places in the world are one in the cathedral in Valletta, Malta and one in St Peters, Rome. The other awe inspiring scene is the frescos in the library built for a Pope. It is equisitly beautiful but very extravagant. Quite different from the new pope, Papa Francesca who is loved be all we talk to for the time he spends out with the people and moving from his big Vatican apartment into simpler rooms.

Time for lunch in yet another fabulous restaurant and now off to the museum. This contains all the relics that can’t fit into the cathedral and has amazing views on the top floor. We climb through each floor exploring the treasures. Then we get to the spot where you can see the views. There is a queue, oh, oh. Anyhow we are tired and sit on the cool marble floor in the line. Thankfully we only have to wait about 5 minutes and are in the last few people to get into the next group.  I thought we would just walk out onto a veranda, but no we have to climb some narrow stairs that wind their way to the top, then a platform and another set of even narrower stairs, Jane is a bit scared but carries on like the intrepid tourist she is. We finally reach the top and are rewarded by views across all of Siena, the piazza, tower and race track on one side, the tower and dome of the cathedral on the other side, this was totally worth it. With the other 20 or so tourists we snap away and enjoy the view.

We eventually head back down and exit through the gift shop. It’s the fanciest gift shop we have even seen, in a side part of the church with mosaics, frescos and a gothic ceiling. Time for a well earned drink and some pannacotta to gives us the energy to go on. Now some more shopping and photos as we wind our way out of the old city.

Back for a shower and clean clothes then we go to a really nice restaurant that Jane picked earlier in the day. I enjoy pasta and truffles.