Day 3 - San Gimignano to Colle di Val d’Esla, about 16 km.
We didn’t sleep well last night, the heating was on in our room which was great for drying socks but rubbish for sleeping - even with the windows wide open. This wasn’t helped when at 4.15, when we were both asleep, the television suddenly came on!! Hahahaha oh well we were up nice and early for today’s walk.
We did a variant of the route today because it should be 31 km but we knew this would be too much. Instead we turned off the main path and walked to this very pretty and extremely quiet walled town.
We had been anticipating today after watching a YouTube video about walking the Via Francigena. After leaving San Gimignano the trail goes up and down into 3 valleys, each with a stream at the bottom that needs to be forded!!!! In the video the streams were so full of water that the people had to take off their shoes and socks and wade across because the stepping stones were covered!
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| The orange dot is where we are tonight. |
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| You can see the valleys that had the fords |
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| Leaving San Gimignano. |
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| Looking back at San Gimignano. |
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| It rained yesterday so the paths were muddy. |
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| Another great view, you can see the path curving down hill. |
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| Another view - there are lots of them. |
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| Gary braving the first ford. Luckily it wasn't too deep. |
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| Up the other side in slippery, clayey mud - thank goodness for hiking poles. |
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| Idyllic |
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| We were both a couple of inches taller than usual. |
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| The second ford - just one giant step! |
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| The last one - the rock Gary is standing on was covered in water and so was the next one , we were very lucky and didn’t get wet feet. |
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| So elegant! HaHa |
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| Mud! Thick, oozy mud! |
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| A random hut and chair! |
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| The town on the hill in the distance is San Gimignano, where we started this morning, the valleys and their fords are hidden. |
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| Another view. |
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| We seem to be on a plateau, all flat except for the mountains in the distance. |
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| We wondered what this huge building was. |
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| It was an enormous and very well maintained cemetery. |
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| A BENCH! So what if it a busy road we can take our packs off and sit down! |
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| Through the gate and into Colle di VAl D'Elsa |
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| Washing hanging to dry. |
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| A cafe. Packs off, shoes off and a reviving sugary drink. We didn’t realize we were only about 50 meters from our accommodation |
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| Another gate. |
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| An ornate building. |
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| Our B and B in a beautiful old building. |
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| View from our window. |
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