San Gimignano

After the excitement of yesterday we decided to take it easy today. We woke up slowly, took a quick trip to town (for more cash and gelato), rested some more outside on the patio and then in the afternoon decided to head to San Gimignano. This is one of the many picturesque Tuscan hill towns. We got there in the late afternoon and decided to walk around for a bit, explore, then get some dinner.

View of the valley from the parking lot

 

 

Charming medieval streets.

 

After wondering around for a bit we came upon a small local wine store which advertised that they ship wine around the world. We were thinking of shipping some local Tuscan wine to the US so we went in to get more information. The store keeper told us how the process works and then invited us to do some wine tasting. We decided on two flavors of red wine and one flavor of white. We were only planning on shipping a few bottles (4-6) but soon learned that this would not add up as the shipping cost goes down the more bottles you ship. We also learned that shipping to US is extra expensive as there are import taxes involved. However, shipping within the EU was free of these fees. We were bummed out at first but then I figured out that we should ship the wine to POLAND!!! This way we will have wine to give as gifts, take with us to the mountains (and share with our whole group there) and then take what's left over to the US in our suitcases. We decided that this would be a great plan and ended up shipping 24 bottles!!!

Here is the shopkeeper showing us one of the wine bottles.

And here is Steve at one of the wine tasting table :)

Feeling very productive and slightly dizzy from all that wine we decided to look for a place to eat. We asked the shopkeeper for a recomendation on the best restaurant and gelato place in town. He gave us both and we headed that way.

 

Cheers!

 

 

Dinner was yummy :)

 

After dinner we did more walking and exploring around San Gimignano and of course got some more gelato! :)

 

We found some interesting things like this (anatomicaly correct) metal statue of a man. He was standing right outside the city walls by one of the main entrances. We did not understand the meaning of this statue but it was still interesting to see.

 

We soon found out that San Gimignano like many other Italian cities does not seam to sleep!! At least not for the first half of the night! The later it got the more people were out and about. In fact, even as late as 11pm there were still plenty of people around.....some older, some younger, some out for a late night walk with a stroller!! It became more and more obvious to us that Italy "lives and moves" by a different rhytm.

Many of the shops were open late and we found one that sold a variety of gorgeous Tuscan pottery. We couldn't resist and got a hand painted plate for our kitchen. The store owner was a typical Italian....very open and talkative. He asked us where we were from and when we told him that we are from the US he shared with us that he has travelled there and how much he loves New York city and Miami. We chatted for a while about differences between living in Italy vs. the US things like the healthcare system, cost of living and the political system. Eventually he had to help another customer but we would have gladly talked with him some more.

We kept on walking and to our surprise found a local city museum that was still open at 10pm and it was FREE! We went in and were told to go down the stairs to where they had a special exhibit. This exhibit was a minature model of the town of San Gimignano as it existed in the middle ages. This minature was made by a small team of local artists. We really enjoyed this exhibit. We learned a lot about the local history as they had information about the city through the ages. Aside from the city minature there were a variety of other exhibits and written materials that showed what life was like centuries ago.

The medieval town minature

 

 

 

 

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