Notes from Abroad

The “early to rise” part of our plan didn’t really happen and we ended up waking up around…11AM? After lazing around for a bit (our hostel was really nice – it was hard not to just sit around and enjoy the luxury of a big room, air conditioning, and free wifi) we headed to the train station. We were told we could take the bus, but we’d missed the one for that hour and decided to go for the train instead.

The train took a lot longer than we’d expected so we didn’t actually get into Siena until around 5:30PM. We knew that the last bus out was at 7:10PM, so we would have to do the speed tour. We bought our bus tickets to save the last minute hassle and set into the city center.

On the bus from the train station we ran into a group of students from the UC system who were studying Italian in Siena. They were nice enough to let us follow them into the main Piazza because we would have gotten so lost.

Once in the main Piazza (the name escapes me at the moment) we decided that the best plan of action would be to see the Duomo first and then get some dinner before hopping on our bus back to Florence.

We’d only planned to take a look at the Duomo from the outside, but after finding out that it was only 3 euro to get in and there wasn’t a line at all we decided to go for it.

Absolutely spectacular. It blew the Vatican out of the water. Though the entire place was jaw-dropping, there was this one room, called the Piccololibraria or something to that effect which was, by far, one of the most beautiful things I’ve seen in in my entire life. The ceiling was painted with these bold, vibrant colors and gold leafing. Though it was similar to some of the ceilings in the Vatican, this one just had so much more impact. The scenes, the colors, everything. All hidden in this tiny little room. We stood there just staring for a good long while.

Unfortunately, spending so much time in the Duomo meant that we barely had any time to eat. We rushed back to the Piazza and quickly chose a restaurant. This time we ordered the Ribollito, a local vegetable soup that was phenominal. Because our eyes were bigger than our stomachs we also ordered the spaghetti pomodoro. Though it was also super tasty, it made us miss our bus.

With no more buses leaving Siena for the day we were forced to take the bus back to the train station to take the ~2.5 hour train ride home. It was starting to get dark out and 2 things were going through my mind: 1) thank god this isn’t Naples and 2) please please please PLEASE don’t go on strike. I really just want to get back to Florence at a reasonable hour.

The fates were on my side because the train left on time (and when I say on time I mean on Italian time, which is about 30 minutes later than your watch actually indicates). Back to Florence in one piece and a day well-spent.

Though we only got to spend about 3 hours total in Siena it was a lot like Orvieto in my mind. It was quaint and not too touristy. Dozens of families gathered in the square around sunset as a man performed what we think was a puppet show (we couldn’t see from our table at the restaurant) and everything was just peaceful and friendly. It’s another one of those towns that really sums up Italy.

Tags: Adventures, City, Italy, Journal, Siena