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At an altar of votive candles in the Duomo of Siena.

My niece, Zoe pushes her toy stroller through the Piazza del Campo in central Siena.

A panoramic  view of Siena, looking toward the Piazza, from the turrets on the roof of the Museo del Opera del Duomo, next to the Duomo proper.

The immense, hexagonal dome of the Duomo with its pattern of stars.

The black and white stone gives Siena's Duomo a striking look, inside and out.

Radicofani is a town that abuts a nearly conical hill at the foot of Mt. Amiata in the Val d'Orcia. At the summit of the hill is the fortress of the ''gentleman bandit'', Ghino di Tacco, of the late 13th century. To a PR man, ''gentleman bandit'' sounds like ''warlord with good PR''.

The Fiat 500 is legendary for its tiny size. How tiny? Here is my brother, Nick, posing next to one. Admittedly, my brother is 6' 4'' (about 2 meters). Still, that's a tiny little car.

It was gray and rainy the day we were in the famous wine town of Montepulchiano. That made the city look moody, but it didn't stop us from drinking a lot of Montepulchiano's fine Vin Nobile.

A pile of fishing nets in the port town of Fiumicino, near Rome.

Fiumicino, a fishing port near Rome where the international airport is located, isn't very picturesque. But it does have a working fish wharf that managed to be photogenic in the sunset light.