Life after 5 o'clock: A tale of modern mystery. Part 1

I always liked a good horror story. A little mystery, a little of the unknown, a little thrill and a reason to breathe faster and faster until you realize it's just a movie.

But what happens when you star in your own little mystery?

What kind of thrill do you get when you wake up in a foreign country, in a strange Medieval city, in a house a few centuries old...alone?

This summer's answer was: my very own horror story, in full HD.

A villa, 2 girls and lots of mirrors

We got to Siena late at night. Too late for 2 girls travelling alone in dusty, hot Tuscany. We got on a wrong bus from the train station. It did not take us straight to the center of the city, as expected, but roamed around on the hills for two hours, circling the city and exposing beautiful hills and narrow streets.

We dragged the bags uphill in the city, through almost empty streets until we got to the Piazza Centrale. It was the first sign Siena is out of this world. Hundreds, maybe over a thousand people crammed in a semicircular piazza, in the dim light of the restaurants, simply lying on the tilted pavement watching the stars.

We found the street of our hotel and we went up and up and up on a winding road. We got to the hotel at 9.

And we found....this

Glued to the door...

We are sorry. Nobody sleeps here at night...

The door was locked.

Panic.

Heavy breathing.

Quick thoughts. Another hotel, a phone call to the travel agency. No. Too late. It's Sunday. The piazza is full. We go back...we can do this..I can do this...

After a moment of panic I see an envelope with my name glued to the door. I open it. Inside a letter and a key.

Siamo spiacenti di non essere qui al suo arrivo

We are sorry no to be here on your arrival

We did it. We missed the curfew.

Who knew hotels have a curfew? Even a 15th century palazzo should have some kind of staff around...

I guess...

Nobody sleeps there at night. We need to open and look for an envelope on the desk. We find it. It's another set of keys. One is for our room on the second floor, the others for another entrance on a different street.

The villa empty. Huge, with lights on everywhere, tall, old and empty. It's a 15th century beautiful palazzo but no one inside.

No one.

Main entrance

We start exploring. The ceiling is arched and painted over with intricate patterns. The floor is marble and the entrance looks like a movie scene for a medieval castle.

The reception desk is wooden, antique and the furniture looks restored beautifully but from a different century.

We go up the stairs, find our room. It's an apartment. Not very big, but tall. Extremely tall.

We leave our bags and explore further.

No sound. No movement. Only lights. And stairs. Lots of stairs.

Ely is freaked. She says she is not sleeping here.

We go up another floor. We find huge halls and waiting rooms with antique furniture and high ceilings, reproductions of famous paintings are hung all over the wall and bookcases with amazing leather bound books and chimneys and sofas and.... No one is here!!!

Hallway

Waiting room

Main staircase

Old chimney

We go up on all 3 floors. There are 12 rooms in total, all locked, and huge halls in between. Lamps and shades and books and flowers and guitars and toys hidden behind a paravan and light and silence and thick walls.

My sister is calling her boyfriend and mother and is actually reminding me that the one to say "this is amazing, this is so cool" is the one dying first in all the horror movies we've ever seen.

I gasp and breathe and take frantic pictures of this beautiful, surreal place and start pinching myself.

I love every second.

And being the first sacrifice for the daunted place doesn't sound like such a bad idea.

On the first floor, we stumble unto a gate leading to an upper garden. It's dark and above the street level but we can distinguish the shadow of a fountain and a statue. Ely says they move. She can't sleep here.

I took us a bottle of Prosecco and some Pecorino fundido to relax a little. But it did the trick. The visit to the little trattoria up the street and the wine calmed us down.

We went back to the villa. locked ourselves carefully in the hotel and then in our room and... tried to sleep. She fell right to sleep in the quilted covers but...the painted angel heads on the ceiling did not bring me much comfort so I spent half the night writing to a couple of friends about the most surreal night of my life and wondering whether I was dreaming or not.