Sienna

On our drive to Siena we steered a little off course to see San Gimignano (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Gimignano)

This walled city is quite large and well restored, to the point were there are many tour busses filling the narrow well restored streets with far too many tourists and way too many merchants. However the incredible quality of the restoration make the town an interesting visit. 

Siena is another beautiful walled city on Tuscany, much larger than San Gimignano and known for the many towers.  Located between Florence and Rome, it had immense strategic value 1,000 years ago. This was when the city states within italy were often at war. 

Being very old , the streets are extremely narrow and merchants set up shop in small streetside "rooms". 

Under the town is a labyrinth of 300 rooms and 16 miles of tunnels in sandstone 

Tuscany is known for its high quality wines, but there is also no shortage of very good $5 bottles of good Merlot and Pinot Grigio--wine that would be $18 at home!

Our residence in Siena was an ancient brick estate that had been total renovated and even had a courtyard and salt water pool. Also it included a small olive plantation with a tranquill sitting-reading area nestled within the trees. 

During one of our days we visited Monteriggioni. It too was a strategic walled city just north of Sienna. It was quite small in size; you could walk from one gate to the gate at the other side of town in a few minutes. It overlooked hundreds of acres of Tuscan vineyards. Unlike most of the touristy cities, Monteriggioni was very peaceful and serene. http://www.monteriggioni.info

Church in Siena