The landscape of cypresses and rolling hills that defines Tuscany
South of Siena, the Val d'Orcia is the Tuscany of postcards: soft green or golden hills depending on the season, lines of cypresses along white roads, isolated farmhouses and hill towns. Its beauty is partly man-made: in the Renaissance the land was redesigned by Sienese merchants as an ideal, productive landscape, and in 2004 it became a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The classic viewpoints are the cypress grove of San Quirico, the curving avenue leading to Poggio Covili, the chapel of the Madonna di Vitaleta near San Quirico d'Orcia and the road from Pienza to Monticchiello. The little town of San Quirico d'Orcia has a Romanesque collegiate church and the Renaissance Horti Leonini garden.
Tip: the light is best at dawn and in the hour before sunset; in spring the hills are greenest, while in May and June poppies bloom between the wheat.
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