My fingers will be tired by the end of this

OK, the promised summary of the field trip. LOTS of sketching- I never want to see another sketchbook again (except my new ones, but that comes later), LOTS of walking; we pretty much walked from 8 AM to 8 PM every day except when eating, sketching, or riding the bus- so for like 6 hours or so a day; and some shopping and fun stuff.
Day1: Orvieto and Todi
At left- the Duomo at Orvieto

The first several days of the trip we visited all mountain-top towns. They were butt-kickers, and as the program director said "you will find out on our field trips, if there is a hill, we must climb it." So very true. Orvieto was like a bigger version of Bagnoreggio, the first field trip we had that I posted the picture link for, so the sides were also sheer cliffs, and Todi was basically the same.
Todi's claim to fame is that it has Santa Maria della Consolatzione, a famous church designed by Bramante which is centralized. It's basically a cube with a dome above and half spheres on the sides- it's very geometrical and precise. I thought it was ok, a little overrated. Then in the evening we went to this hotel in a place called Citta di Castello, which was basically a dead town. It was really weird, because we would get in a from the trips at about 9 pm and go out to eat dinner in this town, which was all dark and pretty much deserted. There weren't any kids, and there were only people at this cafe and one restaurant that we saw each night. So that was a pretty dead place, and we stayed there for 3 nights.

Day 2: Gubbio and Perugia
This day was pretty cool. Gubbio was another mountain town that started in the valley and worked its way up the mountian. It had a huge medieval fortress at the top which had a piazza in front of it that was level. The reason it was level on the side of a mountain was because the Romans had built a grainery below it, so there were these huge 50 foot arches on the side with a drop off, supporting the piazza above. We had to sketch that piazza and then we had a lunch break and wandered through the town, which seemed like it was still stuck in medieval times- they had a lot of stores that sold ceramics and crossbows etc. After lunch we left and went to Perugia, which was a bigger city than Gubbio, and it was on more of a hill, less of a mountain. While we were there they were having their Notte Bianca (white night), where they celebrated their heritage and opened museums for free- but we couldn't go because we had to sketch. While we were there they had a bunch of people in medieval costumes- like Romeo and Juliet, when they guys wore hose and that tunic shirt! Only these people were wearing city colors, and the group of them tossed flags in unison and played drums, eventually parading down the main street. It was so hard to sketch and not to pay attention to this! That was fun, but we had to leave and go back to the dead town of Citta di Castelliano at night. Grr.

Day 3: Montepulciano and Pienza
Montepulciano, as all those of you who know latin might guess, is on a mountian (monte- mountian, pulciano- beautiful? I think?) It was another pretty small, mostly residential, gorgeous view city. However, there is a church at the valley at the bottom of the town, so we climbed up, then down, then up, then down... my butt hurt the next day! I didn't even really like the church that much either! Pienza was after lunch, but we didn't really spend that much time there. Pope Pius II I think it was decided to show his humanism by ordering the building of a well-designed piazza there in like the 1400's,so we just went there and sketched that piazza. This was a view from behind the church, which I just thought was amazing. That was pretty much all we did there, then loaded up and went back to Citta.

Day 4: Arezzo and Siena
Arezzo was just our stop for the morning; it was of course on a mountain, but not all the way up, and we walked through for a little bit before sketching the main square and loading back up on the bus and heading for Siena. The picture below is the head of my history teacher, Ingrid Rowland, in front of the city hall and the campo of Siena. Siena was, I think, the coolest part of the whole trip (and it had the amazing sunset below on the right). It was basically a rival to Florence until 1348? when the Black Plague hit, and the workers that survived started wanting higher wages. The Sienese said no way, and all the workers left for Florence, leaving Siena in the dust afterward. Siena is divided into 17 "contadinas"-basically neighborhoods, each with its own flags, colors, history, traditions, you name it. In July and again in August they have a race called Palio, which each neighborhood sends a horse and rider to compete in. This race is huge! It's held in their main square, the Campo, and all the important families have houses with balconies that open onto the Campo so they can see the Palio. Other people crowd in the middle, and the horses race alond the outside. In July, the Torre neighborhood won after not having won in 40 years, and I know this sounds like I made it up, but some of the Torre adults were still wearing their contadina colors and lanyards and pacifiers (a symbol of being reborn). You would even hear the occasional chants of Torre! Torre! in the street. I bought one of their neighborhood flags because it was so cool. We walked around at night looking for a place to eat and stumbled upon Torre, with their colors still hanging from the houses, having a victory dinner! They had tables in the street and the resturaunts opened their doors and had a buffet for their contadina. All this was despite the fact that they hadn't even won the last Palio in August! The Caterpillar contadina won that, and they had their flags and street lamps out too. The only downside to Siena is that their region doesn't like to cook meat, as we found out that night going to an italian resturaunt where Yacintha and I ordered beef- which came sliced thin and uncooked! They saw that we were confused and apprehensive, so they did take it back and put it in the oven, and it was really good once I felt better about it! The next night (we were still in Siena) we went to a different resturaunt and they had asterisks on the menu next to the "typically underdone" dishes. Note: in Siena, "typically underdone"= RAW.

Day 5: Siena and Florence
You've basically heard all about Siena- we just sketched and walked around a bit, then left to stay at a hotel in Florence that night.

Day 6: Florence
A little of the Duomo, a little of the tower...
I didn't like Florence so much- it was about twice as large as Siena (which had 400,000 people, I think Florence had over 1 million) and infinitely larger than any of the other towns we visited. It was a huge tourist hub, but that meant that the lines were so long and the prices for museums were so high that our group didn't have enough time and money to see most of the things. The Uffizi museums cost too much, and the line to get into the Duomo was too long, so we walked around and talked in our groups mostly. We did get a lunch break during which I got a RED LEATHER JACKET and some shoes (Yacintha had a leather jacket already and Rachel got a jacket in Florence too, hence the picture of all of us wearing one), but it was mostly a lot of walking, talking, and staring at Renaissance palazzi, which really all look the same. Florence was all sort of monochromatic and washed out, except for the Duomo and Baptistry, but they were packed with people. My favorite place in Florence was San Miniato at Monte (Saint something of the Mountian) which was (of course) up the mountain- but you got an incredible view of the city, Brunelleschi's dome, and the mountains behind Florence.