Siena
Today we took a day trip to Siena. We took the bus through Tuscany, and you could see the beautiful Tuscan countryside throughout the hour drive to Siena. Once in Siena, we had tickets for the Cathedral tour in the “Zebra Church”. The kids loved how ornate and pink it was on the outside and kept pointing out all the different decorations.
The ‘gate of heaven’ tour took us under the rafters of the church and to the upper balconies of the sanctuary. It was neat looking underneath the rafters and seeing the wooden cross beams in the areas most people don’t get to see. We could see down into the entire sanctuary and it was awesome. Willow really liked the stained-glass windows. We also got some beautiful views of the city and the countryside in the background.
The church itself was beautiful. When you see these pictures you can tell why the kids call this the zebra church. It was pretty crowded; in fact, I am surprised with how crowded everywhere we have gone has been given the Covid situation. To enter anywhere you need to be wearing a mask, and to go in any museums or attractions or eat inside a restaurant you need to show your Green Card (or CDC card) showing you have been vaccinated or have had a negative Covid test within the last 48 hours. Luckily kids under 12 are exempt from this rule right now, or we would be getting a lot of covid tests! Zoey liked all the pope heads lined up across the top of the sanctuary and was wondering what happens when they have a new pope to put up there (I don’t know the answer to that one!). She also thought the pulpit was really cool, and I had to agree. Ronin liked the really old giant books in the library room. Willow was looking for the Jesus on the cross; she usually goes right to the front of the church to find it. In this church it was on one of the side walls and she didn’t understand why Jesus on the cross wasn’t in the front of the room. Sometimes I just don’t have the answers to their questions!
After the cathedral we went in the baptistry and the crypt, and then made our way over to the Piazza del Campo. We saw some huge pizza and the kids of course had to have that for lunch. Too bad because it tasted like cardboard! By far our worst meal so far here in Italy. Although the piazza was neat to see, once we walked around it we were ready to go. We didn’t climb up the clock tower or do the museum in the civic hall since we had to pick and choose the museums we went to. We did go into the atrium of the museum, which was interesting. I thought the kids would have liked to run around a bit, but it was just too hot! This is where the famous horse races take place twice a year, and they are supposed to happen next week. I’m sort of glad we missed all that because if I thought it was crowded now, I can’t imagine what it will be like in a week! We walked back to the bus station to find we had just missed the bus so we had to wait 45 minutes for the next bus. Everyone was tired, hot, sweaty, and took naps on the bus back to Florence. Back in Florence we got dropped off a 10-minute walk farther away than expected, so of course we had to get extra gelato to stay cool!
