Hotel Executive Siena

Being struck by lightning… twice. Pink diamonds. Winning the lottery. Red-billed toucans (thanks, Google). Snow in Siena, Italy. What do all these things have in common? They are exceedingly rare. Dear friends and family: today we beat the odds. Yup, we are living "Under the Tuscan Snow". Siena was blessed with about 2-3 inches of snow. It...

E' da molti giorni che non scrivo nulla e me ne scuso, coi pochi lettori. I corsi di GPS e l'impegnativa attivitā sociale che svolgiamo qui al CGT mi hanno levato il tempo di scrivervi 2 righe. Ma oggi č un giorno che ritengo vada commemorato e sottolineato, non in senso positivo, ma per cercare di avere tutti consapevolezza della direzione che ...

Siena is just another remarkable Italian city perfectly preserved from the Middle Ages (I wish i could say that) and brimful of classic Gothic architecture. This afternoon we climbed a church tower and we were briefly above the eagles, wind whistling through our hair, and spiritual thoughts racing through our heads, or was that just vertigo? The...

Monday started our first weeklong field trip. Getting three hours of sleep wasn't that great (I was too busy packing, cleaning and BLOGGING to sleep!) I did get to sleep during the long bus ride to San Gimignano though. We got to walk around and look at the medieval town. We bought a few things and were able to take some great pictures of the be...

Well, today we moved into our room at Il Refugio, one of the two residences for PhD students at this campus of Universita di Siena. The dormitory is in a former convent with an associated chapel, which is no longer in use. It is located in the southeast section of Siena roughly between the Porta Pispini and Porta Romana. Siena is a walled city ...

I've had 923 people view this blog in September. That is insanity!!!

Anyway, hello blog readers, all 923 of you. :)

Today was another lovely day in Siena. I am more and more convinced, this is where I should live, once I am independently wealthy. If any of you would like to help me secure that future, please be my guest.
Siena, Tuscany, Italy josiezim

It rained, and rained. And we drove and drove our itty bitty car through the twisty, hilly wet roads. Lauren was nervous, and it didn't help that cars were pulled over on the side of the rode at random, adding to the obstacles I had to be conscious of. Our Y10 Avenue, wouldn't be denied and after an hour and a half we climbed the last hill to Or...

Since our last posting, we spent two more days lounging in the Cinque Terre. We ate the delicious "Pesto Fresco" that the region is famous for, munched on scrumptious and cheap focaccia bread, and enjoyed the view from our guest house's honor system wine bar. We melted in the heat on a "free beach" one day, literally inches from overweight, und...

This weekend the 50 of us embarked on our first excursion our destinations for the day were Siena and San Gimignano. The thought of two cities in one day was a little daunting, all the walking in one and then back on the bus to walk yet another was a little more than some of us were ready for. Bright and early we met at Piazza Adua and boarded o...

So, we were not flying to Bologne, we landed in Forli, a bloody town forgotten in the middle of nowhere. We had to take the bus to Bologne and then the train to Florence. Well, it wasn't that bad. And our "hotel" was quite close to the station, so we didn't have to walk a lot. We left our bags in the room, took our camera and off we went....