Pienza sits in the middle of one of the most photogenic stretches of Italy, and almost every village in a twenty-kilometre radius is worth a half-day. The best Val d'Orcia thermal village is Bagno Vignoni, where the central piazza is a Renaissance hot-water pool. San Quirico d'Orcia, ten minutes west, is a small medieval town with two of the finest Romanesque churches in southern Tuscany.
Further afield, the wine towns of Montepulciano and Montalcino are both within half an hour by car, and the famous Abbey of Sant'Antimo is forty minutes south.
