Italy - Tuesday 5th June

We awoke to an eerie Tuscan fog that seemed to make us feel like we were in the middle of nowhere even more. After last night's epic dinner we were both excited about what breakfast would have to offer and we weren’t disappointed. We were treated to a spread of homemade tarts, cereals, bread and home-made jams, yoghurt's, juice and home-made biscotti and that was before we were offered eggs and espresso's! Definitely got a good deal out of that one.

We were going to Siena this morning before our biggest drive of the trip down the coast to Sorrento. Lou was worried we would have the same problems with parking as Florence, but as the main town part of Siena is completely closed off to cars it was actually quite easy, and we managed to find a space in the local stadium. It was a gorgeous morning and when we stepped into the Piazza del Campo, we were really taken aback – it was just beautiful.

This main square is where they hold the annual horse race (the Palio) that has put the town on the map. Ten horses and riders, bareback and dressed in the appropriate colours, represent ten of the seventeen city wards and race around the square that has been laid with dirt. We started queueing to go up the bell tower of the Palazzo Salimbeni, but the line wasn't moving anywhere and we had to pay 12 euros for the pleasure so we flagged that idea and went to the Siena's version of the Duomo. Again, this was pretty cool, a similar look to the Florence one but way cooler inside. There were mosaics all over the floor, the most notable being The She-Wolf of Siena with the emblems of the confederate cities dating from 1373. Adjoining the cathedral is the Piccolomini library, housing precious illuminated choir books and frescoes painted by the Umbrian Bernardino di Betto, called Pinturicchio, probably based on designs by Raphael.

We wandered back to the car at that stage, knowing we had a lot of miles to cover that afternoon. The drive was relatively stress free, we had lunch in one of the thousand rest stops they have along the motorways called AutoGrills, not a bad spread, salad for Lou & pasta for Hamish.

We were driving south down the middle of the 'boot', passing Naples before going through so many tunnels (the Italians don't believe in building roads over hills, just bowl right through them). Sorrento was a bit manic, it had the reputation as a bit of a resort town as it is the entrance to the Amalfi coast. We were staying just for the night on our way to Positano. We arrived around 5pm, with the hotel's address plugged into the sat nav, but for the life of us could not find this hotel. There was no signs, and according to the sat nav lady the address didn't exist, which meant there were 2 very snappy campers in the wee Fiat. Lou spent a good 30 mins walking up the road asking at each hotel where our places was meant to be, with all very different answers. Eventually, we found it and we were quite unimpressed with the hotel, but it was cheap and we were literally just sleeping there. They didn't have a restaurant so we headed back into town and managed to snare a carpark at the local supermarket (again at a massive cost).

The town itself is nice, very touristy, with lots of expensive hotels and restaurants. We found a spot down on the harbour where we saw the start of an amazing sunset. We were starving at this point, and Lou made the call that tonight was going to be the night we have traditional Italian pizza (when in Rome right?) so we found a little pizzeria, and had one of the best pizzas ever, so yum. Hit the spot too.

Bit of a rough night's sleep as our neighbours decided to have a wee drink out on the shared balcony until really late but wasn't too bad.

Highlight: We really loved Siena, and the pizza in Sorrento was magic.
Lowlight: Trying to find this flipping hotel! Don't worry, I gave them some strong feedback on TripAdvisor.
Interesting Fact: The Siena Duomo has an axis that runs north-south. This is because it was originally intended to be the largest cathedral in the world, with a north-south transept and an east-west nave, as is usual. After the completion of the transept and the building of the east wall the money ran out and the rest of the cathedral was abandoned.