Home > Rick on TV > Guide to Shows > Siena and Assisi

Siena and Assisi: Italy's Grand Hill Towns: Travel Details

This is a quick and handy source for details on the sights, hotels, tour guides and restaurants featured in the "Siena and Assisi: Italy's Grand Hill Towns" show. For much more (and updates), see this year's edition of Rick Steves' Florence & Tuscany guidebook.

Palio

In the Palio, the feisty spirit of Siena's 17 contrade (neighborhoods) lives on. These neighborhoods celebrate, worship, and compete together. Each has its own parish church, well or fountain, and even its own historical museum. Contrada pride is evident any time of year in the parades and colorful neighborhood banners, lamps, and wall plaques. (If you hear distant drumming, run to it for some medieval action, often featuring flag-throwers.) But contrada passion is most visible twice a year — on July 2 and August 16 — when they have their world-famous horse race, the Palio di Siena.

On the evening of the big day, Il Campo is stuffed to the brim with locals and tourists, as the horses charge wildly around the square in this literally no-holds-barred race. A horse can win even if its rider has fallen off. Of course, the winning neighborhood is the scene of grand celebrations afterward. Winners receive a palio (banner), typically painted by a local artist and always featuring the Virgin Mary. But the true prize is simply proving your contrada is numero uno. For more information, visit www.ilpalio.org.

Hospital of Santa Maria della Scala

This museum (opposite the Duomo entrance) was used as a hospital until the 1980s. Its labyrinthine 12th-century cellars — carved out of tufa and finished with brick — go down several floors. They once stored supplies for the medieval hospital upstairs. Today the hospital and its cellars are filled with museum exhibits, including these main attractions: the fancy frescoed hall (Pellegrinaio Hall, ground floor), most of the original Fountain of Joy (from which the replica in Il Campo was modeled), St. Catherine's Oratory chapel (first basement), and the Etruscan collection in the Archaeological Museum (second basement). Cost and Hours: €6, €10 combo-ticket with Civic Museum, daily mid-March-Oct 10:30–18:30, Nov-mid-March 10:30–16:30, last entry 45 minutes before closing. The chapel just inside the door to your left is free (English description inside chapel entrance).

Albergo Bernini

Albergo Bernini makes you part of a Sienese family in a modest, clean home with nine fine rooms. Friendly Nadia and Mauro welcome you to their spectacular view terrace for breakfast and picnic lunches and dinners. Aside from breakfast and checkout time, Mauro, an accomplished accordionist, might play a song for you if you ask (Sb-€78, D-€62, Db-€82, less in winter, breakfast-€7, cash only, non-smoking, midnight curfew, on the main San Domenico–Il Campo drag at Via Sapienza 15, tel. & fax 0577-289-047, www.albergobernini.com, hbernin@tin.it, son Alessandro speaks English). When full, they recommend their charming, bigger, but more expensive apartments (Db-€100, non-smoking, no curfew, located just a few steps downhill from the albergo).

Roberto Bechi

Roberto Bechi, a hardworking Sienese guide, specializes in off-the-beaten-path tours of the surrounding countryside by minibus (up to 6 passengers, convenient pick-up at hotel). Married to an American (Patti) and having run restaurants in Siena and the United States, Roberto communicates well with Americans. His passions are Sienese culture, Tuscan history, and local cuisine. Ideally, book well in advance but you may be able to schedule a visit if you call no later than the day before (full-day tours from €75–97 per person, half-day tours from €32–66 per person, mobile 328-727-3186 or 328-425-5648, www.toursbyroberto.com, tourrob@tin.it). If he's booked, Roberto can recommend other good guides.

Sylvia Gori

The Gori Family, who live outside of Siena, can be contacted directly at:

Azienda Agricola Belsedere
53020 Trequanda (Siena) Italia
Tel./Fax 0577/662307
www.belsedere.com
info@belsedere.com

Another way to contact them is through Roberto Bechi, Rick's contact for the Gori family. His information, taken from Rick's Florence & Tuscany 2006 guidebook (in the Siena section) is above.

Basilica of St Francis

The Basilica de San Francesco is one of the artistic and religious highlights of Europe. In 1226, St. Francis was buried (with the outcasts he had stood by) outside of his town on the "Hill of the Damned" — now called the "Hill of Paradise." The basilica is frescoed from top to bottom by the leading artists of the day: Cimabue, Giotto, Simone Martini, and Pietro Lorenzetti. A 13th-century historian wrote, "No more exquisite monument to the Lord has been built."

There are three parts to the church: the upper basilica, the lower basilica, and the saint's tomb (below the lower basilica). Free entry, lower basilica daily 6:30–18:50, relic chapel in lower basilica supposedly 9:00–18:00 but often closed, upper basilica daily 8:30–18:50 (tel. 075-819-100, www.sanfrancescoassisi.org).