Italy - Day 4- May 3, 2019

Today we traveled to San Gimignano. We woke up  and got breakfast at our hotel. We’d hoped to get up early enough to head back to the Duomo to check out the crypts, but we have not been sleeping well with our room being so warm. The breakfast at the hotel was very good. I love how there is always meats, cheeses, and salad to eat. We got one last look at our beautiful view and set off for the train station.

 

It was fairly easy to figure out, thank goodness! Our train ride was only about an hour. We got off and called a taxi and a man named Stefano drove us to our hotel. The Tuscan countryside is absolutely stunning. Like every photo you’ve ever seen, but you can smell it! Our hotel is cute. It’s call Hotel Pescille and it is a converted farm house.

Our room as an actual key! We spent some time trying to figure out the transportation situation. We are about 3 km outside San Gimignano. There are only private taxis available and the hotel said they can get quite pricy. So we decided to walk! The roads are winding and hilly, with little to no sidewalk. Thankfully, the drivers here are much more careful than in Florence.

About halfway into the city, we found a wine tasting. We decided to stop in and get a glass of wine. We both had Vernaccia; which is the local wine produced out of San Gimignano. It’s my favorite white wine now for sure! A couple from Texas who were also wine tasting explained how they had rented a scooter from the town so we thought we would check that out. We scheduled a tasting lunch for tomorrow and headed back on the road. 

We made it in one piece; tired and hungry but San Gimignano welcomed us warmly with her towers! San Gimignano was once referred to as The Town of Fine Towers. The town was once home to 72 towers! Now only 14 remain.

One of the 14 towers that still remain. 

We stopped at the first sandwich shop we saw because it was now 4pm and we had no lunch. We had small pasta dishes, and bruschetta. Steve tried for a bit to get a car but no luck. We stopped for our daily gelato at Gelateria Dondoli, which included many awards for their gelato. The line out the door definitely had us intrigued, and it did not disappoint. I got chocolate chip which I’d been wanting to try and Steve got chocolate/chocolate chip.

We walked for a bit and headed to dinner. It was suggested by a girl working at the winery we stopped at. It was a very cute restaurant. Mostly decorated in whites and pastels. Steve and I weren’t too hungry so we went small. We both got green salads with olive oil and balsamic. For the entrée, Steve got wild boar meat sauce with pappardelle noodles (which was SO good) . I got spinach cheese dumplings with a hazelnut cream sauce; which I didn’t love, but that’s ok. 

We decided to walk back before it got too dark. We made it about half way before it got very dark but thankfully traffic was a lot lighter. It was quite intense with how dark it was! We even heard what we thought might be a wild boar somewhere in the distance. Today contained so much walking so we spent the evening relaxing and researching dinner options in Venice. This hotel has wine and olive oil tasting so I’m looking forward to that and how much more relaxing and less crazy it is than Florence.

Steve’s favorite things: The countryside views and the medieval style of San Gimignano.

Hillary’s favorite things: THE VIEWS! It’s gorgeous here J