We'd planned to be on the road by 7:30, but Serg's infectious hospitality meant we kicked around feeding the Ducks & Swans until closer to 9. By the time we got out of Sirmione the car was adding minutes to our arrival time every time I blinked.

  We made it to Modena around 11:30. We'd come to checkout the world's number one restaurant, Osteria Francescana. By check out I mean watch the kitchen hands load the veggies as they arrived and snap a selfie out the front, I had an eagle eye open for Massimo, but no luck.

The restaurant is just a few blocks from the old town, we strolled around there and down to the Duomo, you could spend a lot longer here. We didn't get to the see the Maserati or Ferrari museums, next time.

  On to Firenza, where our slow morning and traffic delays cut short a lot of our plans, not Uffizi, no Pitti Palace but the two things on the top of the list made it with a stop at Piazzale Michelangelo to over look the whole city and a trip inside Basilica Santa Croce - the italian version of Westminster Abbey. Michelangelo, Da Vinci, Marconi, Gallileo there are hundreds of important italians either commemorated of actually in-tombed here. On the way in I was telling Max about how a strategy he'd used to manipulate Gab and I was Machiavellian. I explained who Machiavelli was and what he did then half an hour later we're standing in front of his tomb. 

  The road to Siena was far kinder until we arrived. I get this jumpy anxiety in these ancient towns, you never know where you should or shouldn't drive, but there's always someone else ahead making it seem ok. We ended up creeping right though the crowds on a busy early summer afternoon, like Moses, I could eventually part the sea of people but not with any confidence. 

  It was mid-afternoon when we arrived at our hotel, unpacked and 10 minutes later we're on the street. In a few short hours we saw the surface of everything you should, but there are obviously weeks you could spend working on your appreciation of it all. Or you could check in to Il Campo and race the sunset through a refreshment or two. After Il Campo we headed back towards our hotel and down the road to a little restaurant with a terraced back. We sat and watched the sun go down over the Duomo for the perfect end to our first Tuscan day.