Siena

All the guidebooks say that if you're going to fall in love with Italy, it will probably be in Siena. There are a number of other towns and cities where that could happen, not to mention the countryside and coasts, and the Alps, but I'd agree that Siena is a pretty good candidate. It is certainly one of our favorite places and especially its duomo. We drove the blue roads to Siena from Arezzo, enjoying the hilly countryside, found our camper-stop (at length), and spent the rest of the day in town. And then the next day too before departing for San Jimmie-Johnnie and Volterra.

Siena's famous Piazza del Campo

And its Palazzo Publico

In the Palazzo Pubblico museum, a quick and clandestine shot

of part of Lorezetti's great classic, The Effects of Good

Government; Rachel and Will note; there is also the Effects

of Bad Government, and also a fairly famous Maesta among

the other treasures

From the Palazzo's balcony, looking out over a small part

of the city; note color

And up at the great tower

Moving right along, and after a lot of searching for a museum

that turned out to be closed for renovation, we are now in the

Piazza del Duomo, about to enter the Santa Maria della Scala

complex, the city's hospital and social services agency in

Renaissance times; noted, as fitting a republic, for taking

responsibility for the welfare of its citizens; it is now a giant

museum

In its Sala dei Pellegrinao, one of Domenico di Bartolo's

dozen or so giant (secular!) wall murals depicting the good

works of the hospital; note the fat priest with nothing to do but

hear a confession...

The building burrows several stories down into the tufa,

dug out by Etruscans, and there displays its extensive Etruscan

collection

As I have already observed, the Etruscans did some nice metal

work, but little else besides dying into these little sarcophagi,

which all look pretty much the same; to me

Well, evidently they ate well, even without
pasta and tomato sauce and gelato

Speaking of which, mountains of gelato...

And cute pasta for the American college

students