25May

Under the Tuscan Liquid Sunshine
So we are experiencing the coldest Spring in the last 30+ years, along with the most rain in our guide's memory.  Today it even sleeted on us in Siena!  I had on a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, a jacket, my rain coat, my hat, a bandana around my neck and yes I was still cold.  I wasnt the only one on the trip who consulted the average temperature for Central Italy in late May/June.  Roger was also bundled up to.  To add insult to the unseasonably cold, it is also windy!

Now on to what we did today.  We left Perugia and headed to Siena.  Our local guide was very good. She told us that in the medieval times, the city was divided up into something like districts based on the local church parish.  There are 17 groups in the city.  Where you are born and baptisized determines what group you're a member of.  Our guide was a catepillar, who married an elephant.  But they may have lived in the dragon sector, so that means their children (if they had any) would have been dragons, not a catepillar or elephant.  It was very interesting to tromp around in the cold rain to notice the different demarcation symbols on the street corner buildings.  Often cases the street was the neutral zone between groups.  Unfortunately the computer to the big church now museum went down, so we had to freeze around waiting for hand written tickets.  Our guide stood in line for awhile and just as he got to the front the computers came back up.  The church was interesting.  During the 1200s, the Black Plague went through the town of 50,000 that wiped out the population down to 10,000.  Only the rich were able to escape the plague and so the church was left unfinished because the workers all died.  The church if had been completed would have been bigger than the Sistine Chapel.  It now is just an interesting building.  The people who were building the church, both the patrons and workers were extremely superstitious as well as religious, so the building is an ecletic  mixture of Roman Catholic themed walls and ceilings, and pagan floors.  There is one family chapel that has some amazing frescos, and there are also two lesser works of Michelangelo, which he never got paid for because the guys responsible for paying him, kept saying tomorrow to him.  So that's why there are only two pieces instead of more that he was originally requested to do.

Siena also has a unique horse race once in July and once in August.  The Campo Square, which is in the heart of the city has a big area where a square perimeter sand horse race course which is made twice a year.  Originally the 17 groups had a horse in the race, well over time in the 1850s the race was changed from once a year to twice, and entrants reduced to 10 competitors per race.  Each group draws a lot to determine if they can enter the race.  Some districts don't get to race, and they may not get lucky in the August race.  The race is three laps around the course and no rules apply other than the bareback jockeys don't have to be on the horse when the laps are finished.  There is no fiancial prize money, but bragging rights for 1 year.  Our guide said that it was the medieval version of the Kentucky Derby.  The inside of the square is shoulder to shoulder people like the Kentucky Derby infield.

After Siena we got back on the warm bus and headed to San Gimignano.  There it rained on us again. San Gimignano is reknown for it's towers.  Rich people showed off their wealth by building towers.    During the hayday of the town, there were 87 towers, however none could be taller than the cathedral tower.  Today only 11 remain.  Roger and I went to a viewpoint and despite the weather saw some pretty Tuscan landscape.  San Gimignano also has a four time winner of the International Gelato Competition, so naturally we had to try some, even though we were really cold.

We're now in Florence.  Tomorrow we see Michelangelo's David.