Alrighty, here is the long awaited weekend update. I think it will have to only be part one because I need to go to bed soon since I have class tomorrow, but we shall see how far I get.
So, the weekend started on Thursday night. Actually, for some people it started on Wednesday night, as the birthday girl's celebration began at midnight. I did not partake in that celebration as we had class Thursday morning and, after all, we are here for school. So Thursday night we called a couple of cabs up to the Villa, as 9 (4 guys and 5 girls) of us were going out. Sadly, only 8 people can fit into 2 cabs. However, with some cajoling and begging and pleading, the drivers let us in. So we sped down into Florence to a bar that Dani, one of the guys in the program, had heard about from some friends. It was alright, nothing too exciting. In fact, it was an English pub, which wasn't exactly what we were looking for in terms of entertainment. We did get a visit from a guy selling hats through the window, so that was fun, but not enough to entice us to stay. So we moved on to Twice, which we weren't sure if it was pronounced the English way or Italian way, which would be like "Twee-che." We found out it was pronounced the English way by the weird looks we got when pronouncing it the Italian way. In any case, Twice was a dance club, and we had a lot of fun. One could say we had too much fun as we did not leave until about 2am. This meant that we had to find cabs to get us back to the Villa as it was too late for public transportation, and in addition to that, the buses were on strike that day. So we meandered and made our way to the Duomo, where we figured there would be cabs. We tried calling to get a couple to pick us up, but no cabs were to be had. So we finally flagged one down, but we ran intot he problem of 9 people again. So, the other four girls piled in and I waited with the guys for another cab to show up. Luckily, this happened within about 10 minutes. Funnily enough, the other cab got lost and ended up following us up to the Villa once we were in the hills of Fiesole. Needless to say, we did not get a whole lot of sleep that night. In fact, it was about 4 am when I last checked my phone for the time. It was fun though, and I am happy I can now say that I have experienced the night life in Florence.
The next day was our planned trip to Siena. There were 7 of us who went. We met at about 11, caught the 1130 bus down the hill, went to Florence For Fun to book our tickets for the Wine Tasting on Sunday (more on that later), and then headed on over to the bus station. I have done his many a time, the bus from Florence to Siena or the opposite, so it was kind of fun to lead everyone and know exactly what to do. There are two buses to Siena: the Direct which takes longer and goes through more cities, and the Rapid, which goes straight from Florence to Siena. We took the Direct one because it was leaving earlier than the rapid one, but man, did it take forever, about an hour and 40 minutes. However, it still got us there before the Rapid bus, so yay.
Arriving in Siena was like a great big welcome home. Stepping into Piazza Gramschi it was almost like I never left...at least until I looked around. There were some changes I noticed immediately. The first being that the Jolly Hotel is no longer the Jolly Hotel, but the Hotel Excelsior or something. Also, my favorite pizza by the slice store to stop at as we rushed to catch our bus to our weekend destination is no longer there. It was a sad realization. However, as we walked toward the Piazza del Campo, it mattered less and less as the memories came flooding back: where I bought my sunglasses, where I had class, where we stopped for panini's, the Palio, the Contrade, all that is so uniquely Siena. It was fabulous. And telling everyone what was what, and what the flags meant, and some of the history was awesome. I remembered my way around and got us to the Campo pretty quickly. From there was a quick break to look around and use the facilities, and then it was onward and upward, climding La Torre del Mangia. Now I have done this twice before, but the views never get old. And it is amazing to share the view and city I lvoe with the new friends I am making, especially when I see them falling in love with the city as well.
So before I continue, I should mention who these people are. Everyone knows of Lee Catherine and Andrew, my friends from before the trip. Then there is Pat, who Andrew and I met on the plane on the way over here. Also in our group was Olivia, a New Zealander, Dani, a guy who is only 20 and still an undergrad, and Briana, who is a PhD student and has hip problems and so walks with the help of a cane of sorts. I was impressed with Briana because she climbed everything we climbed, and did it with an extremely positive attitude. I think she was paying for it later when she wasn't feeling well, but she says it was worth it.
Anyway, after our time climbing the numerous steps and enjoying the views and taking lots of amazing pictures, we made our way back down the Tower and enjoyed some gelato as our reward. At this point, Dani left us to hang out with some people he met up in the Tower and to hang out in the Piazza. The rest of us headed over to the Duomo, where we bought 10 euro tickets to see the Cathedral, Baptistry, Crypts, and to climb the Double Arches. Olivia left us here to wander the city, while the rest of us went in and explored the Duomo. The Crypts were new for me, so that was nice, and climbing the Arches was fun as well. I had to kind of cajole everyone who was still with me, and tell them that it would be worth it and different from the Tower climb a coupke hours earlier. They caved, followed me up, and were suitibly impressed. We were able to hear the drums from a parade of one of the Contrade as well, which was amazing and definitely took me back to when I lived there and the parades happened every week. We took more pictures before finally climbing down and heading back to the Piazza del Campo to meet up with everyone who had dispersed earlier. Then we slowly made our way back to the bus stop, winding our way through the streets, stopping for some panini's and sweets. Finally we got on our bus, the Direct which is not so direct again, and made our way home. This was an extremely loud bus, which sadly made it impossible to sleep.
So we arrived back in Florence at about 9pm, and were all starving. Dani decided to leave the 6 of us to go party with the people he had met in Siena, and the rest of us decided to stop in a ristorante on the way to our bus back up to Fiesole. So we stopped in the first place that looked good and ended up having a fabulous dinner at about 930/10pm. After much vino and talk and amazing food, we made our way back up to the Villa, catching an 1130 bus, getting us home at about midnight.
All in all, it was a great day with lots of old memories coming back, and new one being formed. The group of people I went with were all very relaxed and it was easy to enjoy the day. I was told I was a good tour guide, which is nice to hear, and I was happy to be able to do it. So much has stayed the same in Siena, which was nice to see. I was afraid it would be entirely different and make me sad. Instead it lived up to my expectations. Olivia even came up to me the next day and told me how much she loved the city and that it was probably her favorite Italian city now, which made me very happy to hear. :-) I guess Siena is a city I will never tire of visiting...which is not such a bad thing all things considered.
So it is now midnight, and I have class in the morning, so I will try to update you all on Pisa and the wine tasting tomorrow. Buona Notte!
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