Wandering in Umbria: A Week in Perugia

“One main factor in the upward trend of animal life has been the power of wandering.” – Alfred North Whitehead

When planning this leg of our adventure I hunted high and low for a vacation rental in Umbria with a pool and with good access to public transport. It seemed that asking for both might have been asking too much and then I discovered Villa Nuba just outside the centre of Perugia.

Vila Nuba sits on a quite road, about a hundred metres from a bus stop, overlooking the Umbrian countryside and about a half an hours walk to Perugia’s main square. We walked it once on our first day which was quite a warm one, anybody even halfway fit would have no problem but with kids the bus was the simplest and best option.

We arrived at midday and after being given an orientation tour and a lift to town by the amazingly helpful Giuseppe we wandered Perugia. The best advice I can give for visiting Perugia is not to come for a day, you must stay for a week. Why? Because Perugia grows on you and over the course of the week, with each visit you discover a little more and your affection for the place grows exponentially.

Just when we thought that we had our fill of galleries we spent a pleasant couple of hours in the National Gallery of Umbria. They had an extraordinary number of works by Perugino and I must say he has joined my list of favourites.

The gallery is well laid out so that you take a journey from medieval art through to the 19th century. I particularly enjoyed the medieval sculptures and carvings.

We also visited a photographic exhibition by Steve McCurry called Sensational Umbria which we all enjoyed as a change from all the paintings we have seen over the past few weeks. It was housed in two separate galleries, an easy walk apart. One was in a very large pitch black room with the photos displayed backlit in frames on the floor.

The other display, at the Palazzo Penna, felt a little bit like the left overs and were house in the basement of a gallery, while the photos themselves were excellent. I am very glad we visited this gallery however as I enjoyed an exhibition here by Italian artist Alessandro Papetti entitled “La Pelle Attraverso”. It was series of nudes, not of supermodels, instead of real people, sagging, bulging and round shouldered exploring the theme of our perception of the body. This of course was cause for much giggling from the kids but it was really very beautiful.

We found delicious Bio artisanale gelato and walked up to admire the view over the Umbrian countryside and also enjoyed just wandering the streets.

The real beauty of Perugia can be found in it's little back streets and byways, with ancient arches and medieval houses leaning across in a friendly manner to those on the opposite side of the street.

On our first day there we noticed little beyond the main square and I will admit that my thoughts were "is this it" but with a second glance you begin to notice the minutiae and you begin to take time to really take it all in.

 

We enjoyed a couple of lovely day trips from Perugia. In fact Giuseppe told us he would charge us an extra fifty euro if we did not visit Assisi, Gubbio and Orvietto. Shhhh please don’t tell him we didn’t make it as far as Orvietto as it would have been a bit far for us without a car. We did make it to the others however and enjoyed them both very much.

Assisi was my favourite of the two. Emma learnt the story of Francis of Assisi at school last year so it was helpful to already have some background before we came.

This was the one day we wished we had a car as we were most interested in seeing the sites made famous in St Francis’s story, such as the Hermitage and the site of his monastery, San Damiano, but as these are outside of the town and up Mount Subasio we couldn’t get there without a walk that was beyond our strength.

The town itself however has a wonderful feeling to it, despite the many tourists. We enjoyed a visit to the fortress at the top of the town, despite the warm day it was brilliant to get a 360 degree panoramic view of the surrounding countryside from its towers.

The children enjoyed exploring its nooks and crannies and found the costumed displays and photographic exhibition showing the candle race through Assisi very interesting.

After spending quite some time there we discovered that yet again we were late for lunch and we made our way down through the town but found it difficult to find a restaurant open for lunch at 2.30.

Luckily heading down towards Basilica San Francesco we found a wonderful Trattoria called Al Camino Vecchio. The food was delicious, the meat was cooked over coals and had wonderful flavour. It was served with rice, beans and piles of grilled vegetables.

Having walked quite a bit that day the kids were less than thrilled with the idea of me taking my time over the wonderful frescoes cycles by the Giotto school in the upper and lower churches in the Basilica of St Francis. But they were very keen to visit his tomb. Luckily the journey there gave me time to enjoy these beautiful peaceful scenes.

The kids wanted to light a candle for my father who has had a lingering case of the flu but were very disappointed to discover you can buy a candle and lay it below his simple tomb but you cannot light one. Inside a number of churches in Italy we have found that your coin donation instead of buying you a candle to light instead switches on an electric candle. The kids are less than impressed with this idea. 

 For our next day trip we decided on Gubbio as the kids were very excited at the prospect of a ride on the funiculare. We were able to catch a bus just up the street from us and enjoyed another lovely drive through the countryside to reach Gubbio. We marvelled at the fact that we had been on the road from the middle of June until the middle of August and still we were seeing sunflowers in bloom. Sunflowers and corn have been our constant companions through Europe this summer, though the sunflowers in Umbria are shorter and with heavier downward facing heads when compared to their French cousins.

After enjoying a very nice lunch the kids got their wish and we rode on the Funivia Colle Eletto also affectionately known as "the bucket of bolts" or as the kids, like to call it "the bird cage", up to the very top of town. Firstly we had to stand on our painted spot on the concrete and then as the bird cage arrived he grabbed us at the right moment and pushed us in and then away we went up the hill. It is a very gentle ride and not at all scary as you are never very far off the ground.

At the top we found our way to the Basilica of Saint Ubaldo which is very peaceful and has lovely medieval stained glass and the Ceri, the candles which are used in a race through the city. We have found that many festivals happen in the evenings, and today was no different and there was to be a medieval archery festival after seven but sadly as it takes an hour to get back to Perugia we missed out on this.

We had heard that St Ubaldo's remains were on display but we expected him to be downstairs in a crypt so we got quite a surprise when we went in and found him in a big glass case behind the alter. He wasn't looking too bad considering for his age, 980 years old, Emma decided he was just to "freaky" but Julian wanted me to take close up photos so he could get a really good look.

 After riding back down in the bird cage we had a quick visit to the Piazza Grande to take in the beautiful view before we hopped back on the bus to Perugia.

We were well aware that there is much more to Umbria and that we have barely scraped the surface, but were very happy to have had the time to come to appreciate beautiful Perugia.

Our next stop was supposed to be Rome but when making our train bookings four months ago a had a few problems with the Trenitalia website and when I finally was able to finalise our booking for the train from Foligno to Rome I had booked it for one day later than I intended. This was a very handy mistake as it gave us an extra day for exploring. But for now I shall leave it there and tell you about our last day in Umbria very soon.

Date of visit 9-16 August 2014