A DAY OUT IN THE TUSCAN HILLS

On our third day in Tuscany we went walking in the lovely countryside.  We took the local bus the the hill-town of Monteriggioni.  This hill-town is about half an hour north of Siena.  It is a small town with a very well preserved wall around the town.  The guide book states" the walls apart, there are no sights bar a pretty Romanesque church - just the long views over the Tuscan countryside"  All true.

The small town square

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The "pretty Romanesque church"

Monteriggioni as we started out on the walk

We had managed to buy a map of the area we were going to be walking in and this included the footpaths created by the CAI - the Alpine Club of Italy.  We also had a description of the potential walk from the book "Walking and Eating in Tuscany and Umbria" which included an outline map and fairly detailed instructions.  These were helpful, although we took a wrong turning at one point but the good map got us to where we wanted to be on an alternative set of paths.  One problem was that the CAI paths were well marked most of the time with red and white numbers but every so often the numbers on the detailed map and the written instructions differed from each other and from reality.   One other helpful thing we did before we left was to look at the proposed route on Google Earth and we had an IPad with us as well on the holiday, although there wasn't WiFi where we were walking!

Looking back to Monteriggioni as we climbed away from the town

On top of a watch tower to take the previous photograph.  It proves we were really there.

A distant view of Siena on the walk

The little church at Colle Ciupi (a hamlet and chapel with deteriorating frescoes inside (true again))

Holiday rental accommodations in Colle Ciupi

Charming front doors

Poppies on the walk

Always lovely flowers

Another view of Siena as we neared the end of the walk

The end point of the walk was the little village of Santa Columba.  We had researched the bus times and there was just one bus back to Siena that afternoon, so we had to catch it.  As we were finishing the walk the storm clouds began to gather.  We reached the village in good time and in the dry but it was obvious that the heavens were about to open.  At its scheduled time the bus appeared and went flying past us and disappeared up the road.  No problem however as it was going to turn around somewhere up the road, out of sight, and come back to pick us up on its way back.  There were two other passengers and we took off at great speed along narrow Tuscan lanes.  The tiny bus rattled along in the opposite direction from were we wanted to go but it dropped off the two passengers seemingly at the back of beyond showing us a lot more of the local countryside before it rattled its was back towards Siena at even greater speed.  It reached the outskirts of Siena and twisted and turned along narrow streets to eventually reach the bus station. A ride of a least an hour for about $2 or about 1.5 GBP, an amazing bargain.

One problem faced us as we got off the bus, it was still pouring with rain so we made a dash into a nearby gelato shop to shelter.  It was fairly obvious that the rain was going to last a while so we put on our rain gear and made our way back to the apartment.

Time for a nice meal in a pleasant restaurant at a very reasonable price.  It had been a lovely day out.

Our final day was spent in Florence.  We took the bus since we were going the take the train there the next day as we left Italy for Switzerland.  The travel times are much the same.  We had booked to visit the famous Uffizi Gallery which houses some of the world's most famous paintings and draws very large crowds.  We had booked ahead because we knew that you can wait up to an hour and a half in a queue otherwise.  In fact you still have to queue to exchange your ticket voucher for a real ticket but that wait was only about ten minutes so we were ahead of the game.  One risk you take with the Uffizi is that they are always changing things around and many of the galleries are closed.  This was the case on our visit but there was still lots to marvel at. 

We had been to Florence twice before and had seen much of what it has to offer so we were able to take things at a more leisurely pace. We visited the large market and the Duomo and bought a leather wallet and change purse to replace some rather battered old ones. Leather goods are a Florence speciality.  Back to the bus station to catch the Siena bus home.  This nearly turned out to be a bit of a disaster as we got on what we thought was the right bus out of many and a last minute look at the front told us we were never going to get to Siena that way.  

One final excellent meal and we were ready to pack for our morning departure to Lucerne in Switzerland.