4-14-10 Monteroni d'Arbia to Sienna (10 day)

4-14-10 Monteroni d'Arbia to Sienna ...i mere thirteen km's not including the other 3.5kms needed once you get to outer edge of city limit and to walk into the center.... in the morning, I said good bye to friendly hotel guy. He did not speak much english but was curious about me and open about himself. He was a grandfather and ran two businesses a furniture shop and the hotel.. he worked easily eleven hours a day and weekends... he had not slept well the night before because he had a slight allergic reaction to some medicine he had to take.. I, on the other hand, slept very well in his hotel..unlike the night before... he assured me that although I had to walk on hwy two, the portion i'd be on was not so bad for walking...for this part of the journey I really did not have a choice..so off I went... I had not really seen Monteroni d'Arbia because I had gotten a room at the very beginning outskirts of it. Even though it was a flat town, which I now equate with more modern towns, there was and old section of it and it had a nice castle like wall, I took a few photos but did not explore it's historic sections later looking at map I think I might of missed something worth seeing... I had decided that for now walking will take president over touristic sight seeing...so I would not explore everything I passed..it turns out that there was a series of little towns pretty much linked together... I figured out that the cars had to reduce speed every time they entered towns so there was only intervals were the cars whipped past me at hair raising speeds. The day had started foggy but cleared quickly into a slightly humid but not super hot sunny day.....… I could tell ever since the yesterday my mood was a bit off... I think this walking along fast car roads was getting to me..the landscape was still charming.. and the frequent towns with their partial side walks helped ease the path...even though it was not a long walking day.. I felt the need to stop more frequently than usual. I also think the stress of this kind of walking made me more tired. The path started rising I could see Siena's impressiveness from at least three hours walking distance away..so compared to what i'd been dealing with Siena seemed really big... I was just noting another cross on the road commemorating a deceased person probably due to car accident when a yard or so in front of me...

I see a moppet seem to loose it's pieces in all directions and the rider flipping over it...i gasped... and of course there was a line of tail gating cars right behind... I could not tell if he had been hit by a car or what...fortunately he did not seem to be hurt...as I approached cars started whipping past him again as he gathered some of the spilled things from the road...it looked like his bike rack had broken off in the back and groceries where what had flown into all directions.. I was not thinking when I approached and spoke to him in english 'are you okay?' he spoke very good english...he told me his moppet had just locked up mid-driving for no apparent reason..so he'd not been hit...and that he was fine... he checked his body symbolically... I wished him a better rest of day, with relief, and was off... cars whipping by as ever...i expected the approach into the center of sienna to be long and drawn out...even though sidewalks became more and more reliable...often they were used by cars for parking... it is a shame that these ancient narrow road towns allow car traffic at all...
Siena was full of youth... college students from the looks of it... and once I got to the main piazza it was hoards upon hoards of school age children apparently here on school trips... there were of course the gatherings of adult foreign tourist groups as well..i was in Siena in 2002..and went and saw almost everything of note...so I did not feel a great urgency to repeat all that... I eventually found a room in a very small albergo...top of rather steep three stories... nothing exciting..showered and dumped my stuff...sign:strong warnings that any attempt to do laundry in room would cost five euro extra..no laundry today then... so off I went to the Duomo, the black and white striped beautiful church.. it had a cover charge ..not too high.. I went in and it was full of tourists but beautiful and charming as ever...

I was able to get my pilgrims stamp here too...it's only been my second attempt to get..usually the gate keepers or ticket takers have the stamps, I am learning... I went in, payed my respects to the bodhisattvas and explored all the alcoves...the striped columns are stunning..the stone inlay narratives on the floors are amazing... each alcove had enough paintings and statuary for a whole modern church..took photos..since I dont know how to describe... but I love this church ..it's beautiful... then back into the streets..i picked up basically food for my room and some wine...then I felt like I was forever circulating to find the internet place i'd found before... I realized the awesome maps put out by Kompass were coming to an end, these maps show walking trails... soon I would have to switch to a road map for cars..sad..hope I am not doomed to walk italian highways for rest of italy piece. I checked internet mostly for map route so I knew which map to buy next... I should mention ...

Siena is very fashionable...and I felt more stared-at here than in the small towns i'd been in... there was also a certain impatience and mistrust that I had not felt in the smaller towns.. people are still helpful but definitely more reserved..and eager to move you along....back in my room I had a picnic and watched german tv and english news...hearing about scary election candidates in Ungarn-Hungary..apparently one of the candidates encourages hate crimes against the gypsies and jews of that country...there was actually a man with a hitler mustache in the crowd...wow...then the typhoon in s india and earth quake in tibet... unlike in the usa, there was several minutes worth of coverage and pretty grafic film footage...so I got a much greater sense of the plight of these various people... I bring this up because it frustrates me how little in depth news coverage one gets in the usa about what effects people other than americans on this planet..
I am not really a news hound but I realized I was sucking it all up because of the novelty of the type of coverage. plus it was kinda cool to switch from american CNN, BBC and then german to see what they thought important