The ginger badger on a bike: The grass is always greener 3rd gennaio 2012

The grass is always greener 3rd gennaio 2012

It was hard coming back to Italy after a week back home. This was my longest trip back to the UK since I left over two years ago. It was a struggle to pull ourselves away and back to Planet Italia. I was annoyed right from the start - there was an annoying Italian woman in the airport pub moaning about British service and the food (I can't really disagree with her really) and then in the queue to the plane there was an Italian guy going on and on to his mama about what he ate in england and what he wanted her to cook for him when he got home. And of course there was the Italian queueing, both in the airport and then getting on and off the plane. So we landed pretty grumpy ready for a long long drive back to Siena from Pisa. Then something funny happened on the way to the forum - we saw a porcupine on our road! That was very exciting.

Of course, I took my usual approach of jumping out of the car and running up the road after it, trying to snap it as I went. You can just about make it and it's big spines in the photo. Then a day or two later we were going to friend's place for dinner and we saw a family of three wild boar trotting across the road! It has been animal-tastic. And this was after a fun trip on to the old colliery site in Nottingham where there was a very rare visitation of a rough legged buzzard, with many twitchers in attendance.
http://thedrunkbirder.wordpress.com/2011/12/17/rough-justice/

Back to Italy it was cold, certainly much colder than the UK, but the sun has been fantastic. When it warms up during the day it gets very nice indeed. Took a lovely walk down on Pian del Lago. This is the site of an old lake outside Siena which drained either to provide hunting or to get rid of malaria or possibly both. It is now an area that is nice and flat which is pretty rare for Siena!

http://www.gdecarli.it/php/circuit.php?var1=1525&var2=2

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/47148265

And then we hit New Year's Eve. We were supposed to go to Berlin with Smokey and Coxen Boxen but Dawn's travel schedule scuppered us. We decided to have some beers and hang out in the square and there was some music, some projections on to the palazzo and it was nothing short of pretty incredible for Siena. Normally the Sienese are stuck in their ways and completely resistant to modern stuff, but this was great. The music and projections went through countries and it was really entertaining. Plus the square seemed to be more packed than during Palio time which is pretty incredible.