BOX 232: Siena and Florence.

Within the walls of Siena, Italy, are two of the world's truly great places: its Cathedral (Duomo), richly complex inside and out in art and history, and the Piazza del Campo, the town 'square' where a horse race is run with full medieval pomp twice a year, under the shadow of the bell tower of the Palazzo Pubblico. But the city as a whole--spread over three hills in the Tuscan countryside--is full of interesting features that the day-tripper is unlikely to encounter, and its maze of narrow streets is a delight to wander through. Even a small, ordinary public space like the one in the above photo (the Piazza di Postierla) has something worth noting: a statue of a she-wolf (symbolizing that the city was legendarily founded by descendants of Romulus and Remus)--and on January 8, 2002, an attractive Christmas tree as well.

Since 1998 my UW-Sheboygan campus had been taking educational trips abroad during our January break (and once during spring break). If you've been following these posts you'll have seen the slide photos I took during our stays in Canterbury (three times) and Bruges (once). Our MO was to immerse ourselves in a historically and culturally important smaller city rather than a great capital. Our trip to Siena was unusual in that we had so many applicants--students, faculty/staff and 'townies'--that the trip organizers decided to expand it to 80 participants, almost twice our previous numbers. It was a complicated operation: we would need two tour buses to take us to and from various places in Italy, not to mention two to take us from Sheboygan to O'Hare and back. And a change in airline routes and prices meant that we would have to fly not to Rome but to Milan and from there split into separate flights on smaller planes: half to Pisa and half to Florence. From those towns a bus would take each subgroup to our hotel in Siena. Fortunately the times worked out so that each subgroup arrived in Siena at pretty much the same hour. Rather than our usual two group leaders plus administrative help, this one had five: Anne, Bob Margrett and myself from the English Department (with me doing the literature part of the breakfast talks) and Tom Uebelherr and our Dean Hernandez in Art.

Many of us spent our first afternoon, a Wednesday, wandering about the streets of Siena and dining at one or another of its many fine establishments. Thursday offered our travelers a historical/cultural tour of the city conducted by professional guides, followed by an afternoon at the Cathedral, led by our art professors. Since I'd been to Siena twice before (see previous posts for my 1983 and 2001 visits), I didn't take as many photos of the city as I might have--and I'd come to realize that the Cathedral and the Campo were impossible to capture in all their grandeur and architectural complexity without aerial or at least elevated views. So for the Campo I have only the following glimpse in the afternoon light of the first day of our visit, with the 1300s bell tower--once the tallest structure in Italy--rising from the Palazzo Pubblico.

For the Cathedral I have this shot, also from that Wednesday, with the west facade in full sunlight:

On Thursday and Saturday of that week I took more photos featuring the Cathedral. As usual my attempt to capture a church interior without a tripod wasn't very successful:

That same afternoon I took a couple of pictures of some of our travelers sitting on the steps of the Cathedral. I won't attempt to name everybody (and couldn't in any case), but you see my mother-in-law Judy in the right foreground taking pictures (she was a very good photographer) and her sister-in-law Roberta with her back to us on the left, with Anne in sunglasses behind her. That's Tom Uebelherr in the middle front with the camera.

In the second photo Roberta is more visible in the center and Judy is taking a picture of our Sheboygan friend Jan Scholke, with Jan's husband John to Judy's right. Another Sheboyganite, Lucy DallaValle. is standing on the far right.

A later, much more distant view of the Cathedral from one of Siena's other hills gives a better idea of the church's size:

Here's an even more distant view, from a park:

And one closer view:

One other photo might be showing part of the Cathedral, but I haven't been able to identify the gothic window or the column:

Some pics I took during our guided walking tour show the typical narrow streets of Siena:

I have no idea why I took three photos of the same intersection; I think I like the first best:

But going back to the day of our arrival in Siena, I see that the first two pics on my slide roll are of the Tuscan countryside from our hotel, the Athena, a newer building on the edge of town above the city walls. I took these photos either from the window of our room or from the outdoor terrace:

Our Thursday walking tour (where we were divided into four groups of 20) was conducted by an organization from Florence called Firenze Antiche. (Ironically, Florence was the great rival to Siena during the Middle Ages.) The next day Firenze Antiche led us on 3-hour walking tours through Florence, upon our arrival in their city at about 9;30 am after an hour's bus ride. We were again divided into four groups, but this time with room for choices: there were two 'easy' and two 'harder' itineraries (the latter involving more strenuous and lengthy walking) and each category offered a more 'historical' or more 'artistic' (art and architecture) orientation. Anne and I took the more strenuous art-focused tour, and I must say it was really the best guided tour I have ever taken: our guide was not only knowledgeable and friendly but extremely articulate, and, in response to our group's strong interest in everything he was showing us, he extended his tour another 45 minutes. (We were certainly ready for a good lunch afterwards, at the Trattoria ZaZa near the Central Market, where the ravioli in walnut cream sauce were great.)

This was my first visit to Florence since 1973, but I took just a few photos--I was probably hurrying to keep up with our guide. Our tour began at the Piazzale Michelangelo, across the Arno from the greater part of the city of Florence, with its magnificent view of the skyline:

My next photo was likely taken from a bit higher up, in front of the church of San Miniato al Monte:

Here are some of us entering San Miniato, along with a closer view of part of the facade, which dates from the 1100s:

From there we walked down to the banks of the Arno, where we had a closer view of the bell tower of the Palazzo Vecchio:

Here's another view, with the Ponte Vecchio on the left:

Once across the river, we walked to the Santa Croce basilica, with its Giotto frescoes and tombs of (for starters) Michelangelo and Galileo.

Later we walked beneath the Palazzo Vecchio's tower as we crossed the Piazza della Signoria:

The Piazza has a great number of celebrated statues or copies. Here's Neptune standing atop a fountain:

And finally (in reference to my photos, not the stops on our walk), the great Duomo of Florence:

After lunch most of us went to museums, chiefly the Accademia, where Michelangelo's statue of David is housed, and the Uffizi, which was open into the evening. Our buses were to leave at 9:15 pm to allow us a leisurely time at the museums or for dinner or shopping. Fortunately, everyone in our scattered groups made it to the bus pretty much on time.

On Saturday, a free day, we explored Siena in small self-organized groups. One stop Anne and I made with our relatives and a few students was a fortress atop one of the hills where an emporium had been built within its walls: it sold Tuscan products like cheeses, sausages, olive oils, and of course wines, as well as crafts. Several of us had an excellent time tasting the local wines, and I took this photo of the pourer:

On Sunday morning some of us took public transportation to Rome for the day, where among other things we attended a mass at St Peter's. I'll report on this day and the rest of our Siena trip in my next post. One more word about this post: I've included a lot more background detail about the trip than I have for most previous trips, but the circumstances were so unusual and memorable that I wanted to provide more context for the photos.