Tuscany Layover Day 2

Our Tuscany daily plan was enforced today. It entailed site-seeing in the morning, a good, filling lunch, an afternoon swim and/or rest at the hotel and then a light dinner.

We had our usual breakfast buffet at 7:30. We then left in the car for Pienza. We got there early enough to find a free parking place. We walked through the town gate and up the main street. Pienza is a small town that is known as the birth place of Pope Pius II. Later in his life, he had the town remodeled in the renaissance style. Today, the town exists with the tourist trade. There are many shops lining the street selling local arts and crafts, cheese, meat, etc. We peeked into a few shops and walked around inside of the Duomo when mass was over.

Leaving Pienza, we continued on to Montepulciano. We parked in a pay parking lot at the bottom of town. We looked for the free lots but couldn’t find them. The trek to the top of the town was steep in one section, but we prevailed. As in Pienza, the street was lined with the same kinds of shops. In addition, there were several wine shops. The city’s famous wine, Vino Nobile, is its major attraction. We did a self-guided tour of Contucci Cantina. I sampled its “young” wine and its Vino Nobile. There was quite a difference between the two.

At the top of the town is an ancient fort. We walked to it and found that the entrance and display area were being used for a comic book art exhibit. We chatted with the young man at the entrance, looked at some of the art and then walked slowly back to our car. We bought more parking time and went back to a restaurant that we saw on the way out and had lunch. I had pici pasta with a tomato and garlic sauce along with a tomato salad. Ann had mixed grill and a mixed salad.

Driving back to the hotel, we got there just in time for the afternoon thunderstorm. Ann’s swim time was interrupted again. In fact it was cancelled because the storm settled on top of us and it wasn’t safe to be in an open area.

We settled into our room by reading and using the internet. At 7:00 we ventured out in the car and went to a pizzeria. We shared a good, crisp thin-crusted pizza with olives, artichokes, ham and mushrooms with a tomato sauce base. Beer was our beverage choice. Pizzerias in Italy serve a lot more than pizza. This one had a full menu. It was crowded by many locals – mostly young families. There was also a table of boys around Sam Morton’s age each eating a large pizza. Service was very friendly. We will be doing this more often.

We were back at the hotel by 8:00, our earliest evening so far.