From whatever direction you arrive, the sight of San Gimignano's profile reared high against the sky is breathtaking. And the enchantment grows stronger as you the Medieval gates to find a city of such incredibly well-conserved architecture that a stroll through its streets seems a voyage back to the time of knights in armor and sea-faring spice merchants. From the height to the top of the Torre Grossa, the gaze sweeps over a vast landscape, one of the most beautiful to be found in Italy or, as, E.M.Forster English writer put it in 1904, over the " view of half of Tuscany steeped in sunlight" .