Scorchio

This blog entry brought to you by caffeine, pizza and sun.

What have we done since my last entry? I can't believe a week has gone past. All this relaxing and eating sure takes a lot of time up.

We visited Pisa to do the usual sights. The tower being the most bizarre and amazing building I've seen. To be 17m off vertical and still standing is testament to the engineering efforts keeping it up-right. To walk up inside is really quote peculiar; as you walk up, on one side of the building you almost feel like you're walking down, even though you are most certainly going up. It's strange to see the grooves worn into the steps move from side to side as the building tilts. The Duomo from the outside looks like a giant humbug and inside is something else. You may not be into religious paintings or architecture, but there truly is some amazing art and craftsmanship that has gone into this building.

We decided to go on a long walk on Friday: 10 miles to be exact, starting early to avoid the midday sun, walking through hills and woodland with views back towards San Gimignano and over hidden valleys. Most of the walk was fantastic until we hit the last quarter. The walking book described the final descend as on a path lined with a mossy stone wall that peters out onto a hunters track, hopefully emerging onto a way-marked path leading to a broad path back to the road. Yeah right. Any walking book that describes a path that 'hopefully' emerges somewhere probably is masking something. Our problem was loggers had destroyed the path and removed the way-marked trees, now part of some designer table of kitchen. Trying to follow the map on a compass bearing failed miserably and we ended up in a vine grove at the bottom of the hill. While never really being lost (we could see San Gim and the main road) it would probably double the length of the walk to follow the road back. We decided to walk up the hill further along as we'd have to cross the original way-marked path at some point. Thankfully it did, after walking up 500m the wifey spotted what looked like one of the few remaining way-marked trees and a path disappearing into the woods. Relieved we followed it and found ourselves on the map. Thinking it was all easy walking from now on was rather taken back to find a fence cutting our path off, declaring the path closed. Closed?! Given the alternatives I decided there was only one course of action. We were going over, and be damned. Recalling all my ninja training we made it over (with some decorum and grace I might add) we walked straight into a work site on a farm. Not quite sure how anyone would react to our presence we decided on a filmsy but accurate cover-story: 'We're lost'?, hoping they wouldn't spot the glaring hole in that we'd climbed the fence. While we gingerly walked past where they were digging, thankfully masked by a tree line we made it to the other side undetected and quickly climbed the other fence.

While certainly not an epic a 10 mile walk turned into a 12-13 miler, through the midday sun and across some major 80% inclines. I must be getting old as I was in bed by 9.30 and slept through...

Woke up next morning feeling rather achy but otherwise ok but realized I desperately need a hair-cut. This should be interesting. We're off to Siena again tomorrow so I'll pluck up the courage to go get it done. Could be interesting what I end up with! What could possibly go wrong?