Tuscany {San Gimignano}

 In the middle of November, Brian had a 5-day weekend due to teacher conferences and Veteran's Day, so Steve took some leave and we went down to Tuscany. We stayed in San Gimignano, just a short drive away from Sienna. It's a beautiful old walled town perched on top of a hill, surrounded by olive groves, vineyards and cypress trees. San Gimignano is best known for its tall towers, that were erected before the town walls were built and they were used to fortify homes and provide refuge during times of battle. There used to be 72 towers when the city was in the height of its power, but the plague wiped out 2/3s of the population in the 1300s and Florence moved in from the north to take over the town during its moment of weakness. The Florenians tore down the towers and redirected the main trade route away from San Gimignano, throwing the town into centuries of poverty. The town is well preserved in its 14th century look because there was no money for renovations. It has become quite the touristy little town and during the day, even though it was off-season when we were there, busloads of tourists were wondering the main drag through town and filling the restaurants, shops, and gelaterias. We stayed just outside the walls, in a small apartment with a great view of the countryside and could easily come and go into the town through an old arched gate. The food and wine in Tuscany were amazing. We had some Chianti that was the best we'd ever had and we brought a few bottles home. The pottery shopping was great here too and we managed to get some Christmas shopping done.

 Above are just some random shots I took as we were driving from San Gimignano to Volterra, from the side of the road, looking back at the town (top, left) and at the surrounding countryside. Everywhere you look in Tuscany, it really does look like this: rolling, green hills, olive groves, vineyards, cypress trees, beautiful old stone villas. It's just insanely gorgeous and peaceful. Which means the kids were bored. Not much to do for kids in Tuscany. They enjoyed walking through the towns but aren't much for sightseeing and even walking around gets boring after a while.

 The kids did enjoy climbing up to the top of town wall for a 360 degree view and the town and countryside around it. They also enjoyed breakfast every morning as Italians don't really do big breakfasts or even cereal. Brian had an orange juice and sugar donut every day, he was in heaven. One morning we were getting ready to go to breakfast and Brian had had this super wiggly bottom tooth in his mouth for weeks, so he gave me permission to pull it out (it was ready, it pretty much jumped out) and so he lost his first tooth in Tuscany! At breakfast, we were talking with a nice Italian lady at the cafe about the tooth fairy and she said the Italian kids put their tooth under an upturned glass on the kitchen table before they go to bed, and when they wake up in the morning, the tooth fairy has left them a nice monetary treat. I liked this idea better than the under-the-pillow plan the American tooth fairy follows. As the saying goes: when in Rome...........