Partly cloudy and mostly awesome is how I would describe the day today, Tuesday. The clouds provided a welcome relief from the sun, and the countryside inspired us with vineyards and trees — Trees! With deep shade! Which Sandy said, at one point today, are her two favorite words.

Today’s leg was relatively short — only nine miles, and not too much of it in the direct sunshine. Like yesterday, it undulated over and between hills, but there was shade much of the time today, beautiful, glorious shade which was even nicer when the breeze picked up.

There were wineries along the trail, too. Right along the trail where you could walk in and order a glass of Sangiovese, or a blended white wine, which we did for lunch.

There were also streams and farmhouses, and off in the distance, our destination, San Gimignano, another hill town, which kept an eye on us as we slowly made our way across the valleys and ridges.

Today was so much easier than yesterday, and we took silly photos and chatted amiably as we ambled along.

San Minignano is a tourist town, filled with some hikers, more bikers, and way more day trippers and out of towners than the previous two places we’ve been.

But we didn’t care. We found a place to sit near the town gate, where waves of tourists flowed steadily by, and toasted our day with Aperol Spritzes for me and our friend Suzanne, and a G&T for Sandy.