We awoke to heavy fog, and wondered what we would see of the Tuscan countryside today.

After a great buffet breakfast at the hotel, we headed off to Monterigionni, a neat little fortress with high walls not far from Siena. With viewing platforms alongside the tops of the walls, and an interactive Armature Museum it was a great place to visit. We had fun trying on different types of armour, chain mail, gloves, helmets and swords.
With a dozen other shops inside the walls, a church and a few eating places it was a lovely small place. The fog cleared a little while we were there and by the time we got to the next location it was a stunning day again.

We visited an Abbey in San Galgano, built in the 1200's it's walls were all intact but it was missing the roof, which was destroyed in the 1500's when the Bell Tower was struck by lightening and fell onto the roof.
We also saw a "sword in a stone" - said to be the legendary "Excalibur" - it looked a bit more like a dagger than a sword. The remains of some human arms (body parts) said to belong to one of 3 men that tried to remove the sword from the stone were also on display. Legend has it that the arms were ripped off by a wolf - the remains were carbon dated and found to match the century in which it was alleged to have occurred.

Just before the Abbey turnoff we'd seen a vista that matched a scene we'd seen in a number of photos and paintings so we stopped to take a picture on the way back down the road. Darry couldn't get the picture he wanted from the roadside so ended up climbing on the car roof to take the photo!

We also saw a cool looking village on a hilltop so with no more specific plans we drove up to take a look. It was not a tourist village and it was nice just to wander around the cobbled narrow streets and see a real life Italian village.

We took a different route back to the hotel admiring the Tuscan scenery on the way, and headed to the pool for some downtime. We'd planned to look through Siena in the early evening but we were all a bit tired so the kids opted for some more time in the pool instead. Tomorrow we head to our final destination - Roma.

Scott: The chain armour was really heavy.

Sarah: I liked trying on the armour. The Abbey had no roof which was cool.

April: The walls around Montereggiano were neat.

Darryl: It wasn't crowded anywhere today! I justify the use of the car roof as it looks like we'll probably end up paying for some of the car rental twice - currently disputing some of the hire fees which we'd prepaid but they want to charge us again - "I'll have to talk to my manager when he gets in" didn't sound particularly promising.