Mark says: We decided overnight that we wanted to go back to the hot baths before we left Tuscany. So today turned into another driving day with a longer visit to San Gimignano. Heading west past Siena we drove to Monterigggioni, a garrison town completely encircled by high walls with 14 towers. The walls were built to guard Siena’s northern borders from invasion by Florentine armies. We drove around Monteriggioni to have a good look at the walls, but it wasn’t until later in the day when we were returning from San Gimignano that we got the best views of Monteriggioni and its walls.
We then passed through Colle di Val d’Elsa on the way to Volterra. This turned out to be lovely looking town with an upper and lower portion separated by a river (we would call it a creek). There were some impressive old city gates and lovely old residential living that we observed on the way through.
The drive to Volterra proved to be very charming as we drove along the top of a Tuscan ridge and were able to get views of fertile valleys on either side of the road. Not far from Volterra, we stopped at a roadside restaurant for lunch. We both had truffle inspired dishes and these were yet again fantastic. I just can’t get enough of the truffle based foods! We spent a bit too long lingering over the food in the restaurant so decided we would literally drive by Volterra and get to San Gimignano as quickly as possible.
San Gimignano was a gem of a town. We spotted the towers from a long way out so stopped in someone’s vineyard to take photos. San Gimignano is famous for its 13 towers built by noble families in the 12th and 13th centuries.
Parking proved to be very easy and we were able to quickly wander in through the main entrance (arch) of the walls into the old town. The main street (ha!), Via San Giovanni, wound its way up hill and was typically lined with an assortment of tourist shops, including a number of torture museums. Down every alley was a view of either distant hills or balconies covered with colorful flowers.
We arrived at the Piazza della Cisterna, the heart of the old town and home of the elaborate town well from which the piazza gets its name, along with bus loads of tour groups, all with their tour guide holding up their folded umbrella or water bottle for the followers to follow! This makes taking photos pretty difficult but we think we got a few good ones.
Around the corner was the Piazza del Duomo including the town hall, now a museum. The view of the towers was good from everywhere. We followed a tourist group up a small alley into a courtyard behind the museum that was full of wonderful old worn frescoes and large fragments of a broken bell.
We wandered further up the hill to the public gardens. These gardens look to be in the ruins of a castle or walled fort. The views of the Tuscan valleys were marvelous in every direction, as was the view looking from the top of the rampart to the towers of the town.
Michelle’s turn: The steps up to the rampart went on and on…. but yes, the views were amazing. It’s quite lovely looking out over a Tuscan valley. There was a guy playing classical guitar down in the park, and so that floated up to us as well, and just made the scene perfect. We went back down the stairs to a little ‘wine museum’ which sadly was all in Italian and so we couldn’t understand any of the videos or displays. We were hoping on a little wine tasting there, but it was a ‘buy by the bottle’ affair and so we decided not to.
We wandered back down into the Piazza della Cisterna, and it wasn’t as crowded this time, so we really did get some great photos! Back down the hill through the windy streets, and past a ceramic shop, so we bought another plate. The old guy serving us was as slow as a wet week, but hey, he loved his work (we think, it was hard to tell).
We were welcomed back to Novole at sunset, by the menagerie of animals. Viola had scored herself a large stick and was running off with it,but Pepito decided he wanted to play with it as well, so they had a bit of a tug-of-war thing happening. It’s nice to be welcomed home by pets!
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