12 December

Has Lyndell talked about Marc and steps? Or perhaps, her experiences with steps while travelling with Marc? Well, the short version is that steps are like a magnet to Marc. He just has to climb them to find out where they may go even if the ‘where’ turns out to be no where interesting at all or a dead-end. For a person who is not that particularly fond of cats, in this regard, he is very much like a cat who just has to climb as high as it can go even if it can not get back down again.

Assisi had plenty of stairways to tempt Marc and we climbed many an ascending alleyway during our brief stay there. In Europe it had been stairs in places like Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower, and castles that had kept us fit and had made Lyndell thankful for the ‘step’ classes she had done before we left. In Assisi, the layout of the medieval town on the hillside together with the narrow spiral staircase to our second floor B&B provided enough exercise for the both of us.

Siena on the other hand offered both … steep lane-ways with and without steps set into them AND monuments with plenty of stairs. Even Marc felt his quadriceps complaining by the end of only 1/2 a day in Siena.

Still, it was worth it. The Duomo in Siena in facade is similar to the one in Firenze – extensive white and pink marble and lots of fine detail with the overall effect being overwhelming. However, we ‘ignored’ the facade and the main body of the church. We bought a pass that gave us access to the crypts and it was amazing to see the extensive frescos painted in an area that the public normally would not see. Also interesting was viewing the excavations that revealed the columns that supported the enormous church above. Again, despite only eve having been visible during the construction phase of the church, they were still ornate. The floor of the crypt had been cut away in several places and covered with thick Perspex to reveal these structures. Lyndell found it quite perturbing to walk out on these clear areas with obviously 10+ metres of drop below her.

(I could not look down at all…..breathing rather heavy…..heart pounding……not good.)

Included in the ticket was access to the baptistery and the museum. In the museum were many of the statues that had decorated both the inside and the outside of the church and yet more evidence of the wealth of the church – many, many works of art with gold leaf inlay, gold and silver artefacts and old books on vellum. The ones on display were music and lyrics (written in Latin) presumably of hymns. Curiously the musical notes were written on four lines rather than five as now and no tempo or key signatures so probably the notes were just to denote the cadence intended for the hymn.

An unexpected inclusion in the museum was access to the roof top by climbing even more stairs – this time back to the tight spiral stone staircases reminiscent of castles. We thought the view spectacular when we climbed up. We took lots of photographs but we were amazed when Marc found another spiral staircase going even higher. Views over Siena were great. Of course, Lyndell had to wait until the vertigo wore off to appreciate the views.

I have it add here that today I felt very strongly the opulence and the richness of the Catholic Church. As it is the focal point of Italy..in every small or large city, it dominates in wealth and substance. It seems such a shame when the average person is economically doing it hard. The art works alone must cost a fortune and the size of the cathedrals or the duomo are amazing. Nothing small ….
I’d an understand why mark Bussa was so against the Catholic Church as all he saw was the no side, I cans ee that now with what we have been visiting…..
However, it is interesting to see the difference in each city of the churches, for example the one today was in black and white and the front if the church complete with three Main entrance doors …not an average door but over the top…was link and white. The churches in Rome are gold inlay and gold leaf- not is much in sienna, will be interesting to see the rest of the places and do a comparative.

By this time the fog was already starting to roll in from the valley leaving one house atop a hill adjacent to Siena initially cut off from the rest of the world by a sea of fog that was rapidly trying to engulf it as well. Quite eerie.

(An amazing feeling watching the fog come in..it looked like the sea)

I had not talked about the fog. When we left Assisi Marc thought to break up the pattern of just going from one church filled town to the next we should include some natural scenery. Therefore he put into the Navman directions to drop in to see the fourth largest lake in Italy that had also been the scene for one of ancient Rome’s biggest defeats against Hannibal of Carthage. Well, the whole way there we were bathed in dense fog and it had not shifted by the time we got to the lake. Nothing but fog,. We couldn’t even see the shoreline. The fog did not start to lift until midday while we were sipping our coffee in the Piazza di Campo in Siena. The weather forecast is for the next two days to be the same or worse although possibly slightly warmer than the minimum of 1degC we had this morning on our drive here.

More steps again…down towards the car and up again…it is like rajah road but three times as long. W enjoyed walking off dinner…not that we look any different…….
Italy is definitly built on hills….each city so far that we have seen is inside Walls so you can understand the Roman Empire of the movies….inside the city walls to protect the people. The walls are huge and extremely hard to photograph. We appreciated more of it as we looked over the city of Sienna…you can see the walled city, reminds you biblically of the song…..Joshua fit the battle of Jericho and the walls came tumbling down…….

Dinner last night was lovely- we went to the local area inside the Piazza de campo…..which is the place where the huge horse race in bare back takes place once a year…..a HUGE PLACE….and dat and enjoyed a dinner of vegetable soup and fresh tortellini pasta….I had one and Marc the other…..the food portions are sufficient believe me…we do not know how they eat three or more courses as we. Can only do the entree…and they are so thin..the people that is. I think because it is all the cigarette smoking …..majority of the people that em have seen smoke….we will go home covered in cigarette smell…quite disconcerting.
However, overall the experience so far has been wonderful…and we are not even at the end if week one yet.

What is striking are all the City Christmas trees. They are beautifully decorated and each town, and of course the major cities have this huge tree. We are now taking photos of the trees and this will e part of our Christmas collage is photos from Europe. Christmas in Europe is huge!!