The chiantigiana road

After travelling through all Japan (have a look to my flickr pictures about the trip to japan) I thought I needed to take a breathe in the tuscan countryside.

So, last Sunday, I took my car and I drove towards Siena, to get to a lovely place in the Chianti area I discovered few weeks ago. The name of the small city is Castelnuovo Berardenga and it is close to Badesse (4km) and Siena (8km). It's just 10 minutes after Castellina in Chianti: one of the most important cities for wine tasting.

There's a nice and big swimming pool at Mulino di Quercegrossa: 7 different pools for swimming, sun bathing, relaxing, diving and walking in the water..
You can enter in the morning and you pay 12 euros (on weekends) but you can also get in after 3 pm and you pay the "afternoon" fee (9 euros). When I arrived it was around 1.30.. and I was a bit hungry. So I decided to go and look for some food just before entering the pool.

I drove back to Castellina, I parked the car just outside the historical center of the small city. And I tried one little italian bar: panino with prosciutto and pecorino cheese, tuna salad and a glass of red wine. Really delicious!
I hardly recommend to visit Castellina, it's quite small, but it's vey nice with the old walls and buildings. And some little nice stores, too.

After the light and cheap lunch I went back to the swimming pool (about 9 km).
I have been 3 or 4 hours just lying under the sun, to enjoy the last warm days of the summer.

When the temperature was becoming a little cold I decided to go away and have a stop at Monteriggioni, which is a medieval town, surrounded by walls and towers (it's not famous as San Gimignano, but I really like it!). I had a lovely "aperitivo" in the main square: 2 glasses of Chianti Classico of Fonterutoli, a slice of bread with porcini mushrooms and pecorino cheese.. and a great sunset. You could also have dinner there. It wasn't expensive.

At 8 pm I finally went back to Florence..