Siena & San Gimigiano

So I finally have a new post for y'all. Sorry it's been a while, I have been having major issues with the wireless connection in my apartment, but I think we finally have it fixed for good...hopefully. Two weekends ago, I went on a day excursion through my study abroad program to Siena and San Gimigiano. We left at 9am and got back around 7 or 8pm that night. Besides the small bit of rainy weather, it was an excellent trip.
Fr. Bruno had explained to me one evening that Siena is considered the rival city of Florence, mostly by a means of art. Florence, of course renown for their art, and Siena have had a numerous confrontations in the past most dealing with a some piece of art. There were two that he was describing to me that really stood out and I thought were pretty cool stories. The first story was basically about when both Florence and Siena were building their Duomos back in the day, Florence had made (at the time) the largest Cathedral in the world. When word of this got around to Siena, they did their best to top them and succeeded in creating a Duomo even larger than that of Florence's. Well that of course didn't stand well with the people of Florence so they ended up adding on to their Duomo and making it the massive structure that it is today. So yes, Florence took the cake on that particular occasion. The second story was about a renaissance painting (sorry can't remember which one ha) that an artist from Siena had painted for their Duomo. Florence was so enamored with the painting, that they kidnapped the artist and forced him to paint a duplicate of the one that was in Siena. He did so and was let go afterward. Not long after the painting was finished, there was a fire in Florence to which of course the painting was destroyed in. I guess some things are just better off the first time around. Anyway, walking through Siena was beautiful and actually reminded me quite a bit of Florence, but smaller. Siena is also located in higher elevation on the Tuscan hills. When we got there in the morning, there was actually a fresh snow on the ground. San Gimignano is a small walled medieval hill town in the province of Siena, Tuscany, north-central Italy. It is mainly famous for its medieval architecture, especially its towers, which may be seen from several kilometers outside the town. While cities in Tuscany such as Bologna and Florence were both a ravaged by war, San Gimigiano was unscathed and still holds 14 towers. It was a beautiful village with some of the most amazing views of the Tuscan countryside I have seen yet.