Four years ago, we had an unprecedented opportunity: spend five weeks in Siena, Italy while Colleen taught a study abroad course. This was the result of the work of our friend and colleague Rebecca, who made the program happen for their department. After a couple of successful years, Leen stepped up to take a turn assisting the program, and she brought us all along for the ride.
Outside of some international traveling I’d done for work, and a short trip Leen took way back in college, neither of us had ever traveled outside of the country at all. Certainly not for this absurd amount of time. So we both knew what an incredible opportunity that was. Once in a lifetime!
Or…maybe twice in a lifetime. Because we’re back, baby! Back in Siena, for another five weeks.
(Pro Tip: When choosing a life partner, go with someone who is smarter and more successful than you, and ride their coattails.)
When you visit somewhere for a certain amount of time, it feels less like you’re there for a long visit and more like you’re living there for a short while. Five weeks, I can tell you, is long enough to develop a routine. To get bored a little. To take a few zero days. To really get to know a place.
And so, coming back was surreal. It had been our home away from home four years ago, when we were wide-eyed and struggling to keep our feet throughout a big mega adventure abroad, with two little kids in tow (8 and 4 at the time).
And it was back in the beforetimes. A lot has happened in the past four years.
We arrived at the Siena train station just as the afternoon was giving way to the softer evening light. I’d describe us as bedraggled at that point…we’d just finished a week in Paris in which the four of us had crammed ourselves into one small hotel room. (One king bed, one tiny loveseat. Not ideal. By the end of the week, the place smelled like dirty laundry and nothing else. Not that I’m complaining about spending a week in Paris.)
Hopping planes and trains to get from Paris to Siena had been exhausting. We had too much stuff, and it all weighed too much, and I came awfully close to breaking my body trying to hoist it up train station stairs (the elevator was out), onto overhead areas on trains, and everywhere else. I had been optimistic that the children would be able to carry most or all of their luggage this time around. Silly, in hindsight.
Because last time, one of them was always in a stroller, and the other wanted to be in the stroller, and sometimes I would be carrying one and pushing the other one in the stroller, and this was not ideal. I did get in pretty great shape that summer, though.
This time around, I’m carrying more bags, but at least they’re using their own legs now.
At the train station, we thought for approximately two seconds about just walking the 30 minutes to our flat before unanimously and simultaneously deciding to get a taxi. A big taxi. ‘Cuz of all the stuff.
Suddenly we were driving up to and through Porta Camollia, one of the historic entrances to this medieval city and its walls. It hasn’t changed much in 800 years. It hasn’t changed much in the last four, either.
Our driver zipped through Siena’s narrow streets. I’d forgotten just how comical it is when a car blazes through these otherwise fully pedestrian paths, missing passersby by inches. And no one flinches, because this is just how it is.
We flew past streets I vividly remember; past the Piazza del Campo, the big open center of the city and site of the Palio horse race in a few weeks; past gelato shop after gelato shop; past the ristorantes and trattorias and osterias where we enjoyed dozens of heavenly meals and aperitivos; past the Duomo, the gilded cathedral and main tourist draw for the little town, left incomplete by the plague centuries ago; and finally to our flat, which will be home for most of the summer.
Siena’s stones have a gently damp odor, like every stony city does. It mixes with whiffs of garlic and oil and butter spilling out from the open doorways of the eateries. And the occasional sweet blast of jasmine; it’s in bloom here for a couple of months this time of year, and it’s heaven, like a life-giving olfactory dessert.
We’re excited. Though we certainly made the most of our time abroad four years ago, we spent a certain percentage of it agape, just trying to wrap our heads around everything. And juggling work (I was, and am now, working remotely while we’re here, and of course Colleen has students to teach and watch over), with youngsters who are, as children are wont to be, impressed with none of this.
This time we know so much more. It’s less that we want to explore (although there’s a lot here in Tuscany we didn’t see or do or taste last time) and more that we want to revisit, this time with more purpose.
Also, I’m going to need an aperol spritz as soon as possible. And some DOCG wine. Ooh, and PICCI! Also some wild boar tagliatelle. Also a cold walking-around-beer (WAB), which you can do here. Mm. So much to get to. It all comes flooding back.
Our last visit there was also when I found a voice writing about travel and adventures. I have this compulsion to document everything and share it, so of course with an incredible experience like this, I blasted my social media with many words and images for every day we were on the continent.
But I was shocked and gratified by how many people came up to me later to tell me they loved following the stories and were always eager for the next day’s post. I was just posting for myself (and because of my own neurosis), but those little interactions told me that other people enjoyed being along for the ride. They gave me the motivation to start writing slightly more formally, and it led me to start Adventure Hat. (So, thank you, mightily, to those of you who have said something—your feedback means the world to me.)
So then. Back to Siena, and a slew of side trips throughout. Time to revisit old adventures, have some new ones, and share them all.
You can follow our adventures in Tuscany here and on the Adventure Hat instagram.