Siena

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  Siena, Tuscany, Italy
Thursday, September 18, 2008

Hello from Siena, Italy!

Thanks to everyone for your well wishes about Mom's travels.  I'm happy to report that she arrived safely on Tuesday afternoon.  She ended up with just a bit more than 24 hours in Venice due to the delay.  But to look to the positive side, Delta upgraded her to business class for her troubles.

After a quick rest after her arrival, we geared up to go make the most of the short time we had in Venice together - and she barely survived the first few minutes of the trip.  Mom opened the door to the hotel and stepped out just as a man came barreling down the alley with an arm full of knock off Luis Vuitton handbags.  She jumped back just in time to keep from getting knocked over and trampled.  Thank to the many action movies I've seen, I knew that the next step in the process was for a policeman to come running by (of course not as fast as the criminal) so I pulled her back just as an Italian cop came flying by

Duomo

.  The bad guy dropped a few of his bags as he ran, but he definitely got away.  So he was lucky for his freedom, we were lucky Mom didn't get mowed over, and the cops got a good work out.  

The rest of our afternoon wasn't nearly as thrilling, but we did have a great time just wandering around the picturesque streets and canals.  We celebrated a safe reunion with dinner and a bottle of wine beside a canal near the Rialto bridge as the sun set, followed by the best gelato place in Venice (for those of you who don't know me too well, I have a minor obsession with ice cream so I quickly surveyed the gelato options and crowned one the best: lots of options, big scoops, amazing flavor, and real sugar cones at a reasonable price! If you go to Venice, I'll tell you how to find it!). 

Wednesday morning, we decided to go to the island of Murano to see where they make the famous Murano glass.  We hopped a water taxi for a morning boat ride just across from Venice.  We had a great time browsing shops for glass jewelry and we found a glass factory to peek in.  We got invited inside the workshop to watch up close!  The men there knew about Steuben Glass from Corning.

Later in the afternoon it was time to head on to Siena.  We took a train from St. Lucia station in Venice, changed trains in Florence (or Firenze in Italian), and arrived in Siena just after dark.  We had an amazing sunset\dusk view of the Tuscan countryside!

We had instructions on how to get to the hotel, but you know that saying about best laid plans?  Well...what should have been a 10 minute journey from train station to hotel turned into an hour and a half long endeavor

Il Campo

.  First, the city bus was late.  Then the bus never stopped at our stop (even though we had been assured by some English-speaking native Siennens that it would).  Then we had to backtrack 15 minutes on the bus to the right stop.  Then we had to trek in the dark through windy, confusing streets to find the place.  Then the reception area was not the place we were actually staying.  So we backtracked 15 minutes over the route we had just schlepped with backpacks to the apartment, up five flights of stairs, and we were finally (finally!) there. Phew.

Dinner on the Il Campo Piazza by moonlight was amazing, then we crashed and went to bed!  Today we've just explored Siena, and tomorrow it's on to Sorrento!

Pictures of Tuscany with the next post!  Internet time is up now - love to you all!

Amanda

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Inside the Duomo	Siena	Siena views	View from our room in Siena

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