Siena

We caught the bus into town and wondered through the markets spending heaps of cash. Oops!

We then saw the first of many churches for the day. Amazingly, all the churches are unique. We then wondered into the Il Campo (town square)stumbling across the first day of the celbrations for the Palio - a famous bareback horse race dating back to the 17th century. The whole square was filled with people singing their districts song. The noise was amazing until all of a sudden you cold hear a pin drop. It was draw time - the officals draw a horse number out of a barrel and it is allocated to a barrier position and rider.

After the festivities had ended in the square we continued the festival of the churches visiting another 5 or more while earnestly searching for the road to the Follonica fountain (which we still have not be able to get to).

At 6pm we headed back to It Campo for the second time today - to watch the Palio time trial - this is a dress rehersal and also a chance for the jockeys to ride the horse allocated to them earlier in the day.

Again the atmosphere was awesome, even if we had no idea what was actually happening. Once underway it was all over in 2 minutes or less. At the end many locals jumped the barriers and charged their districts horse and rider. It was total chaos. It was all over and the square was practically empty again.

Thursday

We started the day with a trip to the hospital - don't worry Mum and Dad, everything is fine.

So, remember how I told you about Cam and the Italian Bug showdown?? Well Cam has a nice welt on his leg about 20cm x 10cm so we thought that as it was growing in size that we should probably go and see a doctor.

€18.59 and some antibiotics later we emerge from the hospital. Cam has to becareful over the next 3 days not to over heat (a side effect of the drugs). This is easy and all if it wasn't 36 degrees outside.....

We then caught the dùbus into town, grabbed a coffee at the Il Campo - now pretty much deserted, before continuing on our quest to find the fountain.

While burning another memory card full (220 images) of pics onto CD we asked the shopkeeper how to get to the fountain, to be told that it is not open at the moment. DOH!!

We grabbed some lunch and then updated our blog before heading to one of the ornate gates on the wall around town.

We are then going to head back to the campground and get ready to move on tomorrow. We are not sure whether we are going to ride to Florence or catch a train to Lucca - it all depends on the weather forecast as Cam has to be really careful about his body temp while taking the drugs.

Until later.... ciao

Click here to see photos of Siena.