April 9
Siena is linked in my mind with their famous horse race, the Palio. A friend, who used to live here, told tales of jockeys who might or might not be bribed and horses that are hidden away the night before the race so as not to be "tampered" with. All in the name of contrada pride!

Luckily, Siena has more to offer than a twice yearly horse race. We visited the Duomo (of course) which has a facade with way too many statues (see photo at right). I also had fun just strolling the streets and looking at the architecture.

I fully intended to climb the 300 steps of the City Tower (really I did!), but in the end I chose to sit in sunny Il Campo with my gelato and people watch. And, oh yeah, it's my birthday today - what a great place to spend it!

One aspect of the tour that I particularly enjoyed was visiting artists that I wouldn't have found if I was traveling on my own. In Volterra we watched an alabaster artist work and here in Siena we visited with a glass artisan in his workshop.
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