Sitting up in Siena

It's hard to believe that horses race around Il Campo, the main square in Siena, twice a year in the Palio.

It doesn't seem nearly big enough for that - and that's even before you fill the central section of the sloping square with as many people as it'll hold, have spectators 6-8 rows deep around the outside and squeeze yet more into all the balconies and windows overlooking it.

We sat up on a bench on a rickety balcony one floor above a deli, eating our panini, looking out over the square, contemplating the number of people and the noise, and it boggled my mind.

I needed a good long wander through the streets to unboggle.

Siena's a good town for pootling around. Plenty of interesting glimpses up side streets, lined with scooters, washing hanging overhead, and into shops that seem to have frozen in time many years before.

There are huge round pizzas on display outside snack bars, mounds of melting ice cream tempting tourists, flapping flags depicting each district of Siena that races in the Palio - my favourite was the dragon, of course, which happened to win the Palio this July, although its residents were traditionally bankers - chattering school kids slowly making their way home, oblivious to all the coach parties disgorged into the centre, students milling around the amazing university buildings, carabineri strolling around like they're on a fashion shoot, instead of being on duty, and distressed ochre and sienna buildings with lion's heads for doorknobs on grated doors fit for a castle.

And then there's the black and white striped Cathedral which looks as if it's been made of icing.