Self-Guided Tour of Siena

While Ashley had classes and homework, Don and I took a 90-minute train ride to the walled city of Siena without a plan. Rather than purchasing the tickets online, we decided to buy them at the train station. Fortunately a lovely employee trained in being kind to tourists helped us navigate the ticket machine. After this, we bought our tickets online from our room. She booked a return ticket, but told us we could take any train back. Unfortunately there only seemed to be one an hour. 

We dozed on the train. Turned out Siena was the final stop. When we arrived at their modern station we had no idea how to find the center of town. I had read someplace it was all uphill, but even with that nugget of information, I did not see a defined uphill.

In the train station we encountered our first pay toilet - a machine collected 50 cents to enter the bathroom. Fortunately, I had two such coins so we could both use the facilities. Later I found free toilets not too far away, but you just don't know when you are traveling.

Above the first set of escalators was a mall, which included a large Pam grocery store. This Jersey girl always feels at home in a mall.

Our phone's GPS guided us "uphill," as in up eight sets of escalators (some of which were smooth, as in no defined steps). At the top we had a five minute walk to a porta entrance to the walled part of the city. 

We had no tickets to tour the cathedral (Duomo) or the theater -- the two biggest attractions in town. I was too sore from climbing the bell tower in Florence to even contemplate climbing the 400+ steps to the top of the Torre del Mangia for the magnificent views. Instead, we walked up and down cobblestone streets, then up and down different streets.

We walked through the stunning semi-circular Piazza del Campo and the Palazzo Pubblico. Thought of Cousin Martin as we wandered inside the Church of St. Martin. We stopped for lunch, and later returned to the same restaurant for a cannoli.

At one point we saw a fancy building I thought THIS must be something important! Historic! Turned out, it was the headquarters of a bank. No wonder I couldn't find information about it in the tour book!

We felt adrift most of the day. I took pictures of neat sculptures -- snails, unicorns, etc. and later read the Siena is divided into 17 different contrades (neighborhoods), each with a museum, fountain, baptismal font, and chapel. They even have their own flag, clearly an identity. They used to be connected to the guilds. I would have played more of a game of I Spy had I realized this sooner.

The city is very photogenic with its narrow streets and flat buildings, often with laundry drying between windows.

As we were running out of things to do, I realized if we caught the 4:14 train we'd be able to walk up to Piazza del Michelangelo in Florence to see the sun set over the city. Unfortunately the train was cancelled without explanation, but we were still able to hoof it to the top of the city for the first of several visits on our trip.

Some random pictures of Siena: