On Friday night we decided to wake up early and head on a road trip to Umbria, with Assisi as our main destination.
After a quick, 3.5 hour, drive through the beautiful Italian countryside, we arrived in Assisi. It is such a gorgeous, clean and quaint city, easily walkable, and definitely worth the ride. St. Francis of Assisi Basilica is the main attraction, so we hit that spot first...hoping to get some shelter and relief from the heat within this huge structure. We were not rewarded with any cool air, but the Basilica was beautiful, in an understated, yet Gothic kind of way. The tomb of St. Francis was also pretty incredible, and there was definitely a 'holy' feeling within the building.
After touring St. Francis we wandered up to Piazza di Commune, on the hunt for shade and something to eat. We grabbed some beers, cold waters, and sandwiches at a Salumeria and sprawled out our picnic blanket in the Piazza in the shade of one of the big buildings. It was the perfect spot for Evan to play, while we ate and people-watched. There were a lot of Americans touring around, and although there were many tour groups, the streets did not feel overly crowded at all.
After lunch we headed to our hotel, another great find through Tripadvisor.com's recommendations, and then decided on what to do the rest of the afternoon. We went to a few more churches and a temple (Santa Chiara, San Ruffino and Minerva temple) recommended by the hotel, began to melt from the heat, went and got gelato (chocolate and coconut combo) to cool off, and then parked ourselves at a restaurant that had misting fans to help keep their customers cool. We plopped our sweaty selves down directly in front of one of the big fans and enjoyed some cold beers while doing some more people watching. A great, relaxing way to spend the rest of this very hot and very humid afternoon. Evan was happy to cool off back in our hotel room where he enjoyed a cold bath before getting ready for bed.
2 funny things about the churches:
-My tank top and shorts were too revealing for the modesty required to enter the churches, so I was provided with shawls--one to wrap around my shoulders and one to wrap around my waist. Josh said I looked like a gypsy, but oh well, at least I got in:)
-Evan's gas would apparently get to the point of where he just couldn't hold it anymore, and big, explosive "fffaaaarrrrrttttt" would just come out at, of course, the most quiet area of the churches. Didn't he see the signs all around demanding "Silenzio"!
After touring the churches and relaxing in the piazza, we strolled Evan to sleep in his stroller, while we headed off to dinner at a restaurant up the street from our hotel. We enjoyed a nice dinner outside, got some cannolis to-go from a local bakery, and then called it a night.
On Sunday morning we got up and headed out of Assisi to Orvieto, another Umbria hilltown about an hour drive from Assisi. Josh had learned of this town after a brief google search on Umbria, and we were so glad that he stumbled across it. Orvieto is such a pretty town, with many 'post-card-worthy' scenes. Pretty cobblestrone streets, window boxes overflowing with fuschia flowers, little parks offering shade and benches, and lots of quaint shops selling typical wares from ceramics, to olive oils, embroidered items etc. The Duomo is the main attraction...a huge, gothic style cathedral, that from the front, looked to me like Florence's Duomo. I would definitely recommend Orvieto as a great town to go for the weekend, or even as a day trip from Naples, as the ride home was only 2.5 hours.
Now home at our apartment in Naples, we are finishing up laundry from our trip, listening to fireworks (a typical, nightly affair around here), digesting our dinner--Josh's homemade mac & cheese..or should I say cheese and mac, and relaxing. We are thankful to have air conditioning after surviving the temps in the upper 90s in Assisi without the hotel having air conditioning. Note to self: when booking hotels in the summer in Italy...always doublecheck for AC as it is not something that can be taken for granted here.
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