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The Hill Towns of Umbria:
An Amble through Time
$2750 Includes All Expenses Except Airfare
Contact Us for 2012 Dates!
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A Week in Umbria
Travel to the tippy-tops of Umbria’s rolling hills to find scores of hilltop towns: hardly buried in time, they easily stand tall with historic character while today’s residents keep them lively. We’ll stay on historic grounds, in the shadow of a nineteenth century palazzo hidden high in the hills. We’ll return every night to the deep blue skies and sounds of nature. During the day we’ll trip to what are our favorite spots; we think they will become yours. $2750 (double occupancy) covers all of your expenses except airfare/transportation to Rome.
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Day 1 – Arrival, Settling in, Evening in Old Spoleto
We meet in Rome and drive together to Borgo Matrignano, a little medieval village owned by a noble family dating from the 1300s that has been lovingly restored with period pieces and updated with modern conveniences (WiFi available in the garden). Our group stays in two 2-bed/2-bath houses and shares a lovely outdoor garden. The Borgo is part of a larger property that houses the architecturally important Villa di Domo Alberini built in the 1700’s. Painted inside in an unusual and convincing trompe-d’oeil style, the interior mixes the holy and the profane. Used today as a meeting place, it has accommodated Brigitte Bardot, Audrey Hepburn, Luciano Pavarotti, and Rudolf Nureyev. Our home for the week is situated on roughly 750 acres of pristine woodlands with two lakes, walking paths, and the villa grounds.
Upon arrival, we’ll begin with a reception and unwind with a stroll around the grounds. Next, evening begins with our introduction to Spoleto, known to Americans for its summer festival in partnership with Charleston SC, but more important in its own right, inhabited continuously starting with the Umbri tribe in the fifth century BC. It became a Roman colony, and after the fall of the Roman Empire became a Duchy under the Lombards. It became a part of the Papal states, but sided with the Holy Roman Emperor in the Guelph/Ghibelline struggles that rocked central Italy in the middle ages. Some historians say that history stopped in Umbria in 1540, the year that the Pope declared a Salt War against the area, causing it to miss out on the Renaissance. Hence, the lovely medieval hill towns. We’ll stroll the city, then dine at Le Casaline in their outdoor garden if weather permits. You’ll find truffles sprinkled throughout many dishes, along with homemade strangozzi (“strangle the priest”) pasta and local “salmon trout.” www.lecasaline.it
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Day 2 Assisi
Sundays sparkle in this town, home to St. Francis, who founded three religious orders and is perhaps best known as patron saint of animals and of the environment. We start the day with a leisurely stroll through Assisi’s streets, stopping for lunch at Trattoria da Erminio, which specializes in local cuisine with a focus on grilling. Then we’ll take a little pilgrimage of our own, winding through medieval streets, meandering by boutiques and artists’ stores. We’ll pass the town square with a stately church built over a Roman temple dedicated to Minerva.
At the end of town, on a promontory that can be seen from as far away as Deruta, lies the monolithic St. Francis Cathedral, an important pilgrimage destination proclaimed a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2000. Colorful frescoes embellish the upper and lower cathedrals. St. Francis rests in a crypt in the lower structure. We’ll do a brief self-guided tour, then exit to meander the charming streets of Assisi once again.
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Day 3 - Spoleto
Today we’ll venture deeper into our home base city. During Roman times, Spoleto was an important town on the Via Flamminia that stretched from Rome to Rimini on the Adriatic. (Superstrada number 3 today passes by Spoleto and follows this old road.) We’ll enter the town walking by the 13th century Torre dell’Olio, from which town guards would pour hot oil on the heads of invaders. Nearby is the Ciclpicha Mura (Cyclops wall) with layers of stones adding to its height, starting with the lowest layer laid in 6-700 BC.
On the way we’ll stop by a tiny “alimentaria” (grocery store) and visit the Padrichelli brothers, Giancarlo and Aurio. We’ll try samples of seasonal goods: we tasted Ricotta Salata con Crusca (a soft sheep’s milk ricotta with bran on the outside) and summer truffles when we were there. Onto Caffe Deglia Artisti (Artist’s Café) where we’ll indulge in a quick coffee and WiFi fix. Next we walk on to the majestic Rocca Albormoziana, built in the 1300’s: a fortress with six formidable towers. Farther down the hills, we’ll view an elegant aqueduct (no one knows if it’s Roman or not) that drapes across the hills below. On the way we’ll stop by a tiny “alimentaria” (grocery store) and visit the Padrichelli brothers, Giancarlo and Aurio. We’ll try samples of seasonal goods: we tasted Ricotta Salata con Crusca (a soft sheep’s milk ricotta with bran on the outside) and summer truffles when we were there. Onto Caffe Deglia Artisti (Artist’s Café) where we’ll indulge in a quick coffee and WiFi fix. Next we walk on to the majestic Rocca Albormoziana, built in the 1300’s: a fortress with six formidable towers. Farther down the hills, we’ll view an elegant aqueduct (no one knows if it’s Roman or not) that drapes across the hills below.
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Next we’ll stroll over to the majestic Duomo, built in the Romanesque style after Frederick Barbarossa (Redbeard) leveled the town in the 1100’s A short walk up reveals charming shops; we liked Desir (Via A.Saffi N.20). There we bought a handful of tiny reproductions of Umbrian churches and houses to scatter around our the base of our Italy pictures at home: a definite step up from ‘frig magnets. We’ll stop for a light lunch in a local bar, then on to the Roman theater ruins and Umbrian museum where ancient statues and relics mark Spoleto’s travel through time.
Optional side trip in the afternoon: Norcia. Foodies rave, but we think it’s just another cute town among many, one that plays its part a little too well. We’ll walk down the main drag where disaffected boars’ heads jut out into the street. We’ll stop in Brancaleone da Norcia www.brancaleonedanorcia.it where Antonio offered us prosciutto and cheese tastings on our last trip. The drive to Norcia from our digs at Borgo Matrignano is spectacular, winding along the valleys of the rich Umbrian slopes. Rest, then dinner at Osteria del Trivio www.osteriadeltrivio.it in Spoleto. It’s homey and inviting; we enjoyed pasta with peas and pancetta and pasta with funghi on our last trip.
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Day 4 - Deruta Deruta means “destroyed,” reflecting the effects of marauding forces that flattened it over the centuries: Goths, Lombards, you name it! In the meantime Deruta managed to crank out refined ceramics through the centuries that are exported worldwide today. Our first visit will be to a tiny ceramics factory where we can view all the aspects of the production: from throwing the piece on the wheel to painting, glazing, and firing.We will tour the store, then head to another shop owned by Roberto Domiziani (http://www.domiziani.com) who makes large scale items at the opposite end of the design spectrum: monumental, edgy, contemporary. Next we will visit the shop of Luca Pimpinelli, who makes beautiful bowls, urns, place settings that never go out of style.
Following, we travel to Luca’s sister’s home where we will enjoy effusive Umbrian hospitality and an endless lunch starting with Prosecco and antipasti (breads, cheese, meats), followed by with pasta and meat and Umbrian wine, and finished with a light dessert with Grappa and Limoncello. We will roll back to Borgo Matrignana where we will take a stroll in the woods and ponder the possibility of dinner!
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Day 5 - Perugia
Even the journey from parking lot to piazza is interesting in Umbria. We’ll park at the base of the hilltop city and take the “scale mobile” (escalator) through the mountain and the Rocca, a fortress erected in 1540 after the Pope won the Salt Wars and claimed Perugia again as his own. We’ll walk through the basement of the fortress, then emerge blinking in the sun to walk along Perugia’s grand promenade, the Corso Vanucci, to the Piazza della Repubblica where we’ll stop for a quick coffee and pastry at Antico Caffe Della Piazza (#34). Then we’ll move on to the Piazza IV Novembre, the heartbeat of today’s town, once the Etruscan central square, later a Roman forum, then the intersection of five important medieval trade roads. The fountain at the city’s center symbolizes the free city of Perugia.
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We’ll wind back through the underground of the Rocca to the car, where we’ll head back to Deruta, this time for linens and wine. First, we’ll visit Sposini Tessuti Umbria (Str Marscianese 37 S.Valentino Della Collina www.tessutiumbri.it) where we’ll see both high- and low-tech methods of producing linens, with an option to buy directly from the factory of course!
We’ll wind up with a wine tasting at Chiorri, a family business where the owners experiment with non-Italian grapes such as Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, creating rich, ruby wines that stand up to their French cousins very nicely! Their white Grechetto comes from a local grape: refreshing and crisp. We’ll dine near “home,” outside on the deck at Agriturismo Villino Bellavista (beautiful view) where the clear Umbrian skies frame the green, fresh panorama below.
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Day 6 - Orvieto
Are all of these hill towns starting to look alike? Absolutely not! After we wind through yet more charming medieval streets, Orvieto’s amazing gilded cathedral rises in Piazza Duomo to reveal a zebra-striped basalt and travertine interior that astonishes. Its history dates back to a Bohemian priest named Peter of Prague who, in the midst of a crisis of faith, saw what he believed was Christ’s blood dripping from the Communion bread onto the altar cloth. Peter brought the cloth to Pope Urban III who declared it a miracle and built the cathedral in Orvieto to house the relic. Orvieto still holds a yearly medieval procession in June to commemorate the event.
After seeing the Duomo, we head to Trattoria Del Corso Pizzeria (Corso Cavour, 49 338 7900303) for a light repast, then back to the Piazza to begin our tour of “Orvieto Underground”, a series of caves and tunnels dug deep into the soft volcanic tufa rock that supports the city. For over 3000 years, Orvieto’s citizens have built cellars and escape hatches into the mountain itself. Of particular interest to us was a clever series of “Pigeon Holes” that the residents used to raise pigeons underground.
We'll wind back among the hills to Spoleto. There, we'll sample regional wines and dine on seasonal local specialties at Ristorante Apollinare before retiring to the Borgo again for an optional evening stroll before retiring.
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Day 7 – Spello, Bevagna
Our last day together centers on two smaller jewels of the Umbrian hills, with a drive down the Sagratino Wine Road. We’ll enter Spello through the Porta Consolare, a Roman entry to the town dating from the first century BC. Hugged by Medieval walls built on Roman foundations, Spello’s streets are studded with colorful flowers and filled with interesting galleries and shops. Its Santa Maria Maggiore is likely built on the footings of a temple dedicated to Juno and Vesta.
We journey on to tiny Bevagna, where the entire town reverts to Medieval times in a festival called the Gaite during June, complete with costumes, food, and archery contests! We’ll visit a cashmere factory and wander the streets, with a leisurely lunch at Ristorante Redibis (Via Dell'Anfiteatro at Hotel Orto del Angeli, +390742360130).
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Next we’ll wind down the Sagratino wine road between Bevagna and Montefalco. Sagratino, Umbria’s most famous indigenous grape, plays the starring role in its DOCG appellation. We’ll taste the wines paired with local foods at the esteemed Arnaldo Caprai winery.
Osteria del Magna e Be just outside of Trevi is the perfect spot for our farewell dinner. We’ll sit outside and gaze for the last time at the twinkling lights on the Umbrian hills as plate after plate of amazing local fare passes along the table, fueled with full-bodied Sagratino. This was an unforgettable evening for us and, we hope, for you as well.
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Day 8 – Back to Roma and Points Beyond
A bittersweet day, goodbye to the Borgo and Umbria. We’ll pack in the morning and lunch in Orvieto along the way to Roma, where you can take flights out the next day, or execute your plans for your next destination.
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