Day 2
While it rained the whole day after we arrived, we woke up to a beautiful sunrise the 2nd day, and it was just a really beautiful day! Here was the view from our room:
We had an early train to catch, so we went downstairs and crabbed a quick breakfast, stopped at a deli to buy some prosciutto and cheeses for our lunch on the train, and we were on our way to Pisa. We were really lucky to have such nice weather while the weather report predicted to rain for the whole week.
After our tour, we walked into the town, looking for a restaurant. We checked out menu from about 4 places. Picked one, sat down, waited and waited before the server acknowledged us and brought us menu. Then waited and waited, and waited... Even the "looked like" owner guy saw us, but no one would come and take our order!? Servers sure saw that we were ready, but they were just standing in the back and talking to each other. I had it. We walked out and went into the restaurant next door. Menu was brought to us, but when we were ready to order, the server said the kitchen was closed.
I was really ticked at this point. Honestly, I didn't believe the kitchen was closed while other people were still getting food. And with the kind of service we were receiving, I hate to think: "does Asian has a bad reputation in Italy?" We left again. Walked further into town/residential area. Found another restaurant, sat down. The menu didn't really have what I was looking for, but it had my beef carpaccio, and there's the pizza for only 3.5 Euro, why not? That's what we had, and of course I could use some wine right away!
After our snack, we're off to our gelato hunt again. We picked the one that had most "local" customers and long line. However our vote was still to Nuova!
We were then ready for our next adventure. We rented a car from Pisa and drove to Siena. First taste of driving in Italy, people were nuts driving there! They had no manner and were really rude. It really didn't matter what the speed limit was, because people would drive at almost double the speed limit. If the speed limit was 90Kmh on the freeway/tollway, expect cars to tailgate you even if you were already driving at 130Kmh! It also didn't matter how fast were you driving already, if people(usually big trucks) needed to change lanes to pass cars; they'd just cut right in front of you and if you had a bad brake on your car, you're in big trouble! There were times that I had to slow down from 130Kmh to 60Kmh in less than 3 seconds! Better be alert and not sleepy when you're driving there!
We made it to Siena, found my old country home to stay at. It's a 300 years old farm house, but super well maintained. Marble floor all over. Very clean and solid. Even came with a very authentic Italian old gentleman who didn't speak a word of English. Therefore we had to write, and all hand gestures to communicate. It was past 9:30PM when we checked in. The amazing part was after we tried to tell him we were heading out for dinner and would be back around 12-1AM, he just gave us the key to the house!
We made it to the Il Campo, and found a restaurant for dinner. We felt like we were eating in a cave where this restaurant was under a bridge between two buildings. We had really good appetitizers: Grilled mix seafood salad and a stuffed eggplant. Unfortunately the entrée: Grilled steak and pork chop were a bit of a disappointment.
After dinner we had our drinks at one of the cafe/bar at the campo. As you can see in the picture. The first round, I got a big cup and the 2rd round I got a small cup. Not only that! The 1st round, I had a Bailey's coffee-really well made! And Viv had a glass of wine. I paid 3 Euro. 2nd round, I had ordered another Bailey's coffee while Viv was still working on her 1st glass, my coffee cost me 4 Euro by itself! So why were they different in price and size? Couldn't tell. We ordered directly from the bar at the cafe 1st and ordered from a waitress for the 2nd. A waitress who had an attitude and didn't speak much of English. I must say so far I didn't have much luck with services. I was very disappointed and bothered by it! Well we still tried to make the best out of it enjoying the view from where we were sitting at. It was a beautiful night after all.
Then we found a smokeless bar, NICE! And off to our gelato hunt, but again not like Nuova! When we were ready to head back to the hotel, we couldn't help but kept up with our "new tradition", which we got to get lost somewhere. This night was worse. We were lost from 11-2AM. We definitely had been making circles, passing the street where we parked our car that we really should walk down but didn't. We tried to ask all people for directions, from cops to hotel concierge, to local residents... We were so lost! Eventually we found our street, drove back and lucked out that as soon as we arrived back at the hotel, it started pouring. By the time we got to bed, it was closed to 3AM and we were beat!
*More pictures on Flickr.