The Palio in Siena - August 16, 2010

Monday August 16, 2010

Senne's Summary: Checked out the cathedral, the view of the Tuscan countryside, the cemetery and the Palio.

Warning: Steve guest blogs about the Palio half way through today’s entry… if you think I’m long-winded…

This morning we were pleasantly surprised to see the spread of food that is available for breakfast at our B&B. Lots of fruit, bread, pastries, cereal, yoghurt, juice and even bottled water!

We went for a walk and came across the Siena Cathedral this morning. It never ceases to amaze me how beautiful the cathedrals are. They started building this one in the late 1100’s. We were allowed to take photos inside of this one ("no flash, NO FLASH!"). I don’t understand why people feel compelled to use their flash even though the signs clearly say don’t and there are constant announcements to remind them…

While we were in the Cathedral, part of the Palio procession came in (drums and all) and picked up the Palio flag from the front of the Cathedral.

I presume they marched it all through town all day as the parade didn’t enter the Piazza del Campo for at least another four hours!

The Cathedral also had a beautiful Duomo and a side room that was the “library”.

The MOST gorgeous duomo!

In the library there were two interesting things. The ceiling was stunning! 

My neck is getting sore from looking up all the time!

They also had what looked like 15th Century handwritten music books. The books were BIG and had amazing art on every page. I was trying to imagine what it was like if your job was to make the music books. It probably took years, just to finish one!

We continued along our walk trying to find the edge of town so that we could see the beautiful countryside. It took a while through the hilly streets, but we managed to find what I think is probably the playground with one of the best views in the world!

View of the Tuscan countryside

We snapped some photos and enjoyed the view for quite a while. Steve noticed a cemetery in the distance so we decided to see if we could find our way over there. (We both have an unusual fondness for cemeteries…)

We had to walk back into town, and then back out another entrance, but made it over to the cemetery (almost like we knew where we were going😀). It was very beautiful. I was pleased to see that most people in there lived a LONG LONG life. Seriously. Not many younger than 80. Siena must be a good place to live! People take the cemetery very seriously. Every single grave had flowers (in good shape, mostly fake) and photos. The cemetery also had a breath-taking view.

We headed back into town for lunch and then our afternoon siesta.

The Palio description is written by our guest blogger Steve… as I did not want to stand in the crush of people and watched it on TV from the comfort of my room 😉

The scaredy cat Lisa chose not to venture forth and mix with the locals to watch the Palio live, instead she watched it on TV from the safety and comfort of her room at the B&B.

The race was to begin at 7pm, but I had it under good authority to head down to the Piazza Del Campo around 3:45pm.  The wait for the race was LONG.  The first hour, nothing was going on except people claiming their standing room only space in the middle of the track.

At 5pm the parade into the Piazza began.  As usual I was disappointed in the parade because no one threw candy…parade organizers of the world…It’s not a parade if you don’t throw candy.  Well, I guess technically it’s a parade, but without candy, what’s the point (sorry, I digress, as usual).

This is the most repetitive parade ever created.  Like Lisa mentioned earlier, the Palio has been held for just over 400 years, and the parade format has yet to be changed.  Each Contrada (and there is approximately 17 of them) enters the Piazza with flag bearers, drummers, horse and knight, and racing horse…all decorated in their Contrada’s colours.  The group stops at 7 different points around the track and does a flag routine accompanied by drummers (this routine lasts about 8 minutes)…remember this is done 7 different times around the track and every Contrada does the same routine.  The only difference is the colours of each group and the Knights armour is different for each Contrada.  This is entertaining for the first 16 minutes and then it is 2  ½ hours of repetitiveness and waiting…

At 6:30 the officials enter the stadium on a regally decorated cart pulled by oxen.  This was cool because the four Ox were frickin enormous.  Check out the pics, I did not know Oxen were that huge.  This cart sped the parade up because the racers were entering the stadium at 7pm.  So the cart acted as cleanup for the parade.  With four full size Oxen coming at you, the parade of Contradas sped up considerably.

The racers enter the track and the local crowd goes nuts.  Each rider and horse stop in front of it’s decorated section in the stands and these locals are shouting encouragement to their rider like they are going to kill someone.  The riders make their way to the start line, and ride in together in a large circle about 10 metres from the start line.  At this point the energized crowd starts to hush…and eventually you can hear a pin drop in the Piazza. It turns out we are waiting for one of the officials to draw starting lots.  He announces Tartuca (Turtle), he gets the inside rail.  The Tartuca Contrada supporters cheer very happily and all other Contradas let out a big groan.  This continues for spots two, three and four…and curses start erupting from the crowd (their Contrada has not yet been called and therefore at a significant “short track” disadvantage).

Once they are all assigned spots and are lined up, then the real fun begins.  There are no gates, just a rope and the horses and jockeys crammed in side by side. The jockeys are nudging, ramming each other’s horses, hitting each other at times…until the official commands them all to back off.  He then calls one by one in the same order (more bashing each other…trying to get the advantage when the rope goes down).  Each time a jockey hits another or nudges another horse, the respective Contrada who feels their horse and rider have been mistreated, erupt in curses towards the other rider/Contrada and officials)…we have to re-lineup a total of 5 times (this took 30-45 minutes…but was very entertaining watching and listening to the crowd).

At last, the race begins…these riders are nuts…it’s about a 400 metre dirt track and theses riders (bareback) are pushing their young steeds for all they’re worth. The race is three laps…very exciting.

Halfway through the second lap a horse buckles, falls, and throws the rider into the many hooves of the other horses.  The horse quickly regains his feet and continues the race (riderless)…rider was quickly dragged off the track before the next lap came around. The race ends with Tartuca being victorious.  The inside starting position definitely has it’s advantages…although he was not leading the first lap, he grabbed the lead in the second and held on to it for the next two laps for victory.

The canon sounds to end the race and immediately two different groups flood the track.  The first group are Tartuca supporters and they are surrounding their Champion, celebrating as if they have just won a war…cheers, tears, hugs, kisses and lots of screaming and shouting.  The other group are Contradas that feel they were wronged….these groups are not mad at the victor (Tartuca) they are wanting to have words with other Contradas that they feel caused them to lose….two large groups (50 a side) meet at one end of the track and it’s looking like it’s going to be an all out rumble.  The polizia are between the two groups in about two minutes and everything quickly reduces to shouting, swearing and goading the other group.  A lot of posturing to show they will not be taken advantage of next year.  A small skirmish erupts within the centre track area but is quickly broken up.  Then it’s all Tartuca…celebrating around the track, carrying the rider turned hero on their shoulders.  They carry him through the streets to the Duomo/Cathedral where he will be blessed by the cardinal.

Angry spectators... shirt off... ready to fight!

They take their Palio very seriously, with many religious undertones.  It is said that the victorious rider is reborn in the eyes of God.  I don’t know about that, but he sure looks happy.  Celebrations for Tartuca continue on the streets (parading through all Contradas)…proudly displaying and wearing their Tartuca colours, drums celebrating, over the next two days…this I guess will go on for at least a week.

The parade that never ends...