I'll never forget the drive to San Gimignano.  You can see the 14 towers from a few miles away and the view is stunning.  I absolutely love this quaint medieval town.  The history is so interesting and they produce fabulous white wine and beautiful painted ceramics. You can go up to the top of one of the towers but I think they close it if it gets too windy.  That did not make me feel too great about going up, but my husband insisted so up we went.  I have to admit that I didn't make it to the top :(  The stairs are metal grids that you can see straight down through and my legs were like jelly...and I swear I felt the tower swaying!  Anyway, in your Tuscan travels, definitely stop and see this unique town!

This is the best place for icecream in San Gimignano. The place has won several awards for the best Italian icecream. It's all homemade of course. Besides the regular tastes, they also have icecream of limoncello and the best one is the Vernacchia icecream. Vernacchia is the local white wine and the Vernacchia icecream is so nice! So, when you go to San Gimignano, go to this gelateria. You won't regret it!

In the program here we go on weekly field trips on Wednesdays. Our field trip yesterday was to San Gimignano, another cute, old hill town. It once had many (like 90) towers now only has 9 :(  However, nine seems quite a lot still, there is one almost everywhere you look. Like the title says: very quaint. In fact we thought it needed 'It's A Small World' type and gestures when saying 'Little Medieval Village' to really get the point across. A fact set off by the millions of little chotchkey and artists' shops and restaurants along the main street. Also by the millions of people added to by our 43 or so that are here from Cal Poly. Still though it was beautiful and old and the towers make it look fairly different than your average tourist Tuscan town. We went in the church in the main square, can't remember the name, that had beautiful romanesque era frescos. Then up to the old fortress (etruscan I think) that is now a very beautiful park with great view of the countryside. Did a little sketch and it was time for mangiamo!

The highlight of the day was most clearly the food. A truffle, ham and pecorino stuffed pizza then rasberry rosemary and peach gelato (separate flavors). Someone must tell The Scoop about the Rasberry, it was Incredibile! We spent our lunch time people watching in the main square, and since there were so many tourists about it was quite entertaining. We played spot the Americans, which is pretty easy most of the time. Also spot the gold shoes which the Europeans seem to LOVE. Even regular old athletic shoes come in gold lame.

We also walked around quite a bit on our own and did a little souvenier shopping. I bought, among other things, some panforte for my self which is like a ginger almond jelly cake thing. We stepped into an artisan cheese shop which smelled amazing. But mostly took lots of pictures and soaked in the medievaliness. Some of those pictures were from the top of one of the towers that is open to the public (for a price). I'm not sure if it is the tallest but it sure seemed it.

Then back up to the fortress for some more sketching. I did a watercolor instead. The afternoon was quite nice since a harpist (?) was playing for a little while, then some American choir group started singing into the well in the middle of the space. It was really relaxing to be painting in the very pleasant shade and listening to all this great music.

Then a very hot bus ride back to CF and school again...

After we told the girls about are amazing day in San Gimignano, they decided they wanted to go check it as well.  I had planned on going to Sienna that day, but I really wanted them to see this amazing place. 

We pretty much did the same things we did on the first visit just so they could see a lot of the the cool things we saw.  On the top floor of the Museo Civico, they had a modern art museum which was pretty interesting.  My daughter thoroughly enjoyed that one since she's an artist.  There was pretty bizarre pieces but there were also a lot of really cool pieces like this big wooden tiger that was constructed like a puzzle.  It's kind of hard to explain but it was like those wooden puzzle kits that are assembled into the shapes of animals or buildings.  The amazing thing about this one was the size of it and how many pieces there were to it.  That guy must be a genius to create something like that.

Fred took the girls to the top of the tower after the museum and Megan was not too fond of those stairs.  I guess I passed on my heights anxiety on to her.  I feel pretty bad about that.  That's not a nice fear to have.  Anyway, she made it and Fred took pictures of her gripping the handrails for dear life as she ascended and descended the never ending stairs.

After the museums and the tower, we decided to take the girls to that nice little restaurant we had visited before.  Again, we had a lovely meal there.  I really need to find that card so I can write a review.

We finished our meal and then did some more exploring.  It's amazing how many more things you discover if you revisit a place.  We found a lot of cool little artisian shops that sold all sorts of cool things.  I could have easily spent a fortune there.  I did buy some beautiful stationary, some decorated ceramic bottle spouts, Venetian glass bottle stoppers, a cool sunshine windchime and of course olive oils, bruchetta mixes, spices, etc. 

This was our last day to our wonderful trip and a nice ending to it as well. 

Our 12 hour trip home was not so enjoyable however.  We discovered our dog was ailing and we were stuck in traffic jams in the Alps.  Talk about feeling helpless.  We took him to the vet as soon as we got home and found out that he may have a tumor in his mouth.  We have to take him back to the vet tomorrow so that he can do a biopsy.  I've cried as much as I can for the last couple of days and now I'm just trying to be strong and hope for the best.  I know he's 16 and that's a long life for a dog, but that does not make things any easier.  He has been with us all those years and has traveled with us so many places throughout the U.S. and Europe.  I guess what is the hardest is that I do not want him to be in pain yet I don't want to be responsible for taking his life.  He doesn't appear to be in pain and has an appetite.  I just don't want to be the person that decides his life should end when maybe it shouldn't just yet.  I can't imagine waking up every morning and not seeing his adorable face look up innocently at me.  I know I'm going to have to accept that it will be his time one day, I just was hoping that he would go peacefully in his sleep. :-(

San Gimignano was by far my favorite place to visit and it was only 12 kilometers from where were staying!!!  Fred and I went alone of the first trip there.  The girls opted to spend a day in the pool at the villa.  It was again broiling hot, but I did not care one iota!  This place was so marvelous.  Its in the Sienna area and is so rich with history that you can feel it as you walk through the narrow streets amongst the midieval houses and buildings.  It's incredible!  It reminded me of another Rothenburg, Germany, the famous midieval walled city, only more magnificent.  This town is also full of many museums which of course we had to sample.  The first museum we visited was the Museo Archeologico.  This one was definitely my favorite.  It houses many Etruscan pieces ranging from pottery pieces to funeral urns.  It also contained a middle-ages pharmacy complete with the fragant herbs they used in the different rememdies.  It was interesting to see all the decorative  pottery that contained their prepared medicines.  I also found it fascinating to discover some of the material they used in these medicines.  Items such as scorpion oil, ground metals, dried roots, herbs, sand dollars, and pretty much anything they might thought would be part of a remedy was used.  The leather-bound registry books from the middle-ages were also displayed.  Everything was penned in so incredibly neat and with no mistakes.  They had no White-Out or delete buttons back in those days.

The next place we decided to visit in this amazing town, was the Museo Civico which had a small museum and then the largest tower in S.G.  The climb up the tower was a little daunting for me since I'm not fond of heights but I was determined and made myself (just like with the climb to the top of Blarney Castle and the elevator ride to the very top of the Eiffel Tower).  It was so worth it too.  The views from up on top were breathtaking.  We took many pictures from here but none of them do the real view justice.  It's so hard to capture the complete picture (just as with the Duomo in Florence).  We spent quite a bit of time up here since it was just so incredible.

After our descent from the tower, we decided to find a place for lunch.  With all the tourist restaurants dotted through that place, we really did get lucky and find a little hidden gem.  There weren't even any other diners there at the time either.  The waitress and waiter were very friendly and helpful.  I grabbed the card but now I can't seem to find it.  If I do come across it, I'll be sure to update this post in case anyone else wants to check it out.

After lunch, we decided to head over to the bird museum since we bought a ticket that allowed us into all three of these museums.  Normally, that would not be a museum I would opt to visit.  It was this very small museum housed in an old church (which I thought was interesting).  The birds on display were collected from the late 1800's to early 1900's.  It was pretty neat to see since many of those birds I had never seen or heard of before. 

On our way out, we decided to hit one last museum.  It was the wine museum and this one was free.  I was interested since I'm from Napa (another famous wine region).  It was small and had a video showing the wine making process (it was all in Italian though), then another small room with some video slides, and then the tasting room.  We asked the hostess which one she recommended and she offered us a really nice Chianti.  Usually that is not my choice of wine, but that one was wonderful.  I should know better.  Usually the wine tastes better when you get it directly from that region and this was definitely true in this case. 

That about wrapped up our wonderful day.  We headed to our home away from home and went for a nice swim.

San Gimignano is a beautiful hilltop town in Tuscany.  The towers in Tuscany were built by wealthy families to show their strength and power, and to provide security.  San Gimignano, with its stone streets, archways and towers is a must see while visiting the region.

Some suggest that you should skip San Gimignano and head to Volterra because that hilltop town generally has fewer tourists, but I disagree.  Although there are more people visiting San Gimignano, they is more people for a reason!  It's beautiful!

A nice winery just outside San Gimignano is Torciano Winery.  We ate lunch there in the winery's wine cellar and had a full wine tasting.  One of the benefits that this winery offers is a lifetime guarantee on prices.  If you purchase wine from them on your visit (either to take with you or to ship back home), they will give you that same price on reorders of the wine for life.  ;-)

Tour Guide Information:  I have provided the tour guide company information in my "Rome" entry for Tuesday, October 2, 2007.

We visited San Gimignano today.
is a small walled medieval hilltop town in Tuscany. It is mainly famous for its medieval architecture, especially its towers, which may be seen from several miles outside the town.

I really enjoyed the beauty of it. Finally we had some good weather, and we had a great day.
We looked around in the little shops, had a delicious lunch and visited the beautiful duomo, saw the towers and all that, and... OFCOURSE.. bought an icecream at Pluripremiata Gelateria (the best ice cream shop in the world!).

Today we went on a field trip to a city called San Gimignano, a former feudal/medieval town located on a hill.  The city is pretty much a tourist trap with a good number of shops, restaurants and gelato spots.  There's a couple of interesting sights to see including some 14 medieval towers out of 70-80 that are still standing.  We were pretty much on our own today as far as touring goes.  Some of us walked up to the top of a fortress to get some cool views of the town and landscape below.  Patty, Krystie, Brian, Veronica and I split an 8 euro pizza that was excellent but not filling enough.  We did a quick sketch and then ordered another one!! Then we got gelato! (Told ya we liked to eat!) We browsed through some shops afterwards and then got some groceries to take back home at a local store called the "Coop".  There's a Coop by school too, but its too far to walk to on foot!  The town was ok to see I guess, but you probably only need a couple of hours, not a whole day.  I think a group of us will go to Pisa this weekend for a day trip.  We've got a week long break coming up so that's got to get planned out too.  There's just too many places to see here!  Some options include, but aren't limited to: Athens, Brussels, Berlin, Munich, Prague, Barcelona, Madrid, Copenhagen, Salzburg, Vienna etc...My roomates might be going to Athens and Cairo, but I'm not sure about that yet for me at least...We'll see...It's hard to decide where to go for a couple of reasons.  First, I want to get to as many countries as I can while I'm here.  I also want to go to places during that week that are hard to get on the weekends.  We could possible go to Munich and maybe even Spain on the weekends, but it's a stretch though.  Anyways, a little research into the prices too will probably influence the decision as well...

Any suggestions?? :)

We could have chosen to end the day here, but we have more places to see and, sadly we had to leave the magical city (we´ve promised ourselves to go back).

We drove on the evening through the windings roads of Tuscany. We learned with celerity why there was so many people who wanted to come here, just to see this region of italy: neverending hills, like a sea in yellow and green, with cypresses like ancient guardians of the fields.

If you want to go to Tuscany there is a lot of options, a lot of villages to visit. We´ve just chosed one: the famous San Gimigniano, to visit, but there is a lot of thing to see, enjoy and taste.

San Gimigniano owes its fame to its multiple towers. Once of my friends told me it was called "the medieval Manhattan" because the broken skyline of this town. Certainly, living in Italy at that time must be incredible, with so many cities with hundreds of towers (Bologna had a lot of them too), but San Gimignano survived better than others. Is still real, still medieval. I reccomend you to go uphill until a little terrace in where you can try, and buy, the famous Chianty wine with an espectacular view of the tuscany´s landscape (Can´t remember the name of the place, but San G is small, so you´ll find it without problems!).

TRIP TIP: Beware of cars!!!! San Gimignano is a crowed place and there´s no much place to park, so the parking lots are incredibly expensive!!! About 2 euros each hour, and it´s difficult to find a place. Choose well when to go (earlier the better), be patient and if you can avoid car, perfect.

San Gimignano is a very touristic place, but ... beautifull and... a separate wine region, so I had to visit this little town also! The famous towers have been used for noble people as status objects, but also for having a good view in the environment and seeing city army crowds comming for the little town (hmm well... I think they did not have any power in that time to resist the army of venice or torino or... any city.... haha)

The white wine of San Gimignano is superb! The grape is called Vernassia! Try the Terre di Tuffi!

well, i don't remenber the name of the place we bought the ice cream, but i don't think it matters, i guess this place does generaly have the best ice cream in the entire world! and it was much cheaper as in florence! a huge choise and not one of us was disappointed! just the ice cream there is a reason to visit that charming place! well we were lucky that the big amount of tourists arrived after us!

Agriturismo Pogiacole is a working farm about a mile outside the walled city of San Gimignano. The owner, Stefano Bartalli is one of the nicest people you will ever meet and speaks great English. The farmhouse is on a beautiful piece of land that include a vineyard of red and white grape vines as well as olive trees. It has an infinity pool which is great for lounging during the day. Breakfast is included in the room rate which is served up by a local who lives at the farm. She doesn't speak much English but she understands enough to get by at breakfast. We have stayed here twice as a couple and plan to go back again next time we make it to Tuscany. Great, great place to stay!!!

Let me finish up with the end of my visit in Florence. It continued to be hectic and crazy, but wonderful. Florence is such beautiful city, but the people there have made a deal with the devil. There are so many tourists there, that you rarely hear Italian over the complaining and kvetching of the Americans, Japanese, and other Europeans. While I waited in line to see the David, the young American couple behind me fought about whether it was worth a 3 hour line to see Michelangelo's masterpiece. They were really fighting and she finally walked off and he waited around and then went after her. I wanted to turn around and say, yes, it is worth a three hour line -- people have no problem waiting 3 hours for a ride on a roller coaster that lasts 2 minutes, but seeing what I consider the most impressive piece of art in the world is a problem -- it makes me sad. While in line I ran into students from Tech who were waiting in line and a man who lived across the street on the fourth floor kept holding things out of his window for us to see -- like his dog. He also warned us about the pigeons dangerously overhead, which I thought was nice. The best part of the trip to Florence was the last day, it was still raining but we went to the Boboli Gardens, where the rain stopped -- they were beautiful. Then on the way to the next site, the meanest Chapel in the world, Santa Maria del Carmine, I found the sandals I have been looking forward for the past 4 years, but the store was closed. On the way back from the Chapel, the store was open, and it turns out that they only make shoes there, but fortunately Ann will be in Florence next week, so they are being made for me and Ann can pick them up, my shoe dream has come true. After the shoes, Joyce and I went to have a few cocktails, and devoured the potato chips. Then we went to dinner, it was the best dinner of the trip. I had gnocchi, fried zucchini flowers, and an entree of asparagus and parmesean, if you are ever in Florence, eat at Mama Gina's. After packing my new luggage and sleeping one more night in my kick ass room, we were on the road to Rome in the rain. Our pit stop for the day was San Gimignano near Sienna. It is a hill town known for its towers. It used to have 57 of them, now 14. Its another town that has sold its sould for tourists, but it is really beuatiful. It wasn't raining there, but soon after we left, the temperature dropped and the rain came, it was like winter. 50 degrees and pouring as we arrived in Rome. Joel got a little lost, but we got checked into the hotel, my favorite of the trip, the Albani. Leslie and I got our transit passes and raced off to the Vatican so I could show her where to meet me the next day. Then it was back in a taxi through crazy Roman traffic to make it for the welcome dinner -- veal and potatoes -- yummy.