We continued on through beautiful Umbria to Orvieto. Sitting on a cliff above fields streaked with vines, and olive and cypress trees, this town presents one of the most dramatic postcard like Italian hilltop towns and is gorgeous from first sight.
Orvieto was a major centre of the Etrucscan civilization and is a thriving city today. It’s most famous attraction, and the reason we are here is the Duomo of Orvieto which is a spectacular site that can be seen from some locations in the distance standing tall above the town. Few churches in Italy can hold a candle to its wedding cake of a Gothic cathedral, which elicited gasps of wonder at its layers of exquisite detail when I saw it a few years back.
I thought it one of the most beautiful I have ever seen and wanted the girls to see it…stunning inside and out!
Another hilltop town, Bagnoregio seems hewn from the rock on which it rests. Straight out of a fairytale book, it sits strikingly on its volcanic tuft of rock where the Etruscans founded the town more than 2500 years ago.
I was looking forward to this beautiful village perhaps more than anywhere else on this trip- it had called to me since I very first saw its picture. This stunning little gem has escaped the modern age mostly because of its topography, teetering atop a pinnacle rising high into the sky above a vast canyon ruled by wind and erosion. This amazing place is dying and will collapse in some years as earthquakes and erosion have caused the edges to give way which is irreversible. While this has sadly marked the fate of the village, on the other hand everything is complicit in creating a breathtaking and almost unreal landscape. Today only six locals live here and the only way in or out is by a narrow and very steep pedestrian footbridge, which certainly tested our fitness, carrying our bags. Supplies are ferried in on mopeds or the tiny little local trucks.
The main entrance is a huge stone passageway, cut by the Etruscans 2,500 years ago and decorated in the 12th century with a Romanesque arch. Passing through the portal, you enter another world- one stuck in the medieval Italy.
There is no list of attractions…it’s just Italy…an artist’s dream with each lane and footpath holding a surprise. Ivy drapes over arches and scrambles up walls of ancient houses decked with flower pots…
with its quaint, cobblestone streets Civita really does feel like walking into a fairytale…
…complete with friendly cats who follow you as you make your way through the tiny village- especially Karen who is like a cat pied piper.
Wild donkey races are held here in September, which I imagine would be interesting, but sadly, not while we are here
and I think to myself what a wonderful world 