The Great Escape

  Sept 28 - Perugia (Day trip to Assisi) Having experienced some pretty steep hills yesterday, today, on arrival in Assisi, we took the easy option and got the bus to the top of town before strolling down! 😊 On a recommendation we first visited a couple of churches in the upper part of town.  Both nice, although nothing spectacular, but considering where we were, i.e. Assisi, I suppose we were both thinking they’d be a little bit special (sorry St Clare! 😊 ) Walking through town though was very nice, really ‘Olde Worlde’, with some great piazzas, cobbled lanes, some Roman remains, and, because it’s in the hills, lovely views of the local countryside.  It’s not often that I’ll mention food on here but today we found a sensational restaurant, overlooking the walls of the city and just metres from the Basilica of Saint Francis, we chose it simply for its location. The food however was superb and, considering its setting, it was no more expensive than most other places w...

  Sept 27 - Perugia (Day trip Spoleto) Off to Spoleto today, an ancient city in the foothills of the Apennine Ranges.  Divided into the medieval upper town, and the predominantly modern lower town, our initial goal was to head up to the fortress at the top of the hill.  In theory this was going to be relatively easy as the town has installed a number of escalators all the way to the top making it an easy ‘climb’. However, signage to said escalators being non-existent, we found ourselves wandering around town for ages before finding our way up.   The fortress, the ‘Rocca Albornoziana’, was built in the 14th century and was originally part of a fortification system constructed by the church to strengthen its military power.  Today however, it houses the ‘National Museum of the Duchy of Spoleto’, although in more recent times it was used as a prison.  Having some great views of the city and the local countryside it also overlooks the magnificent 13th-centur...

  Sept 26 - Arezzo to Perugia Travel day.  It was an easy train journey from Arezzo but our first impressions of Perugia were that it was definitely a bit ‘ordinary’!  Not somewhere that you’d definitely do an immediate ‘about-turn’ but not far off it! However, once we’d off-loaded our luggage we took off for a walk into town which was a huge improvement. I should actually say we walked UP into town as this was one of the steepest hills we’ve encountered for a long time and it certainly burned off a few ‘cals’! 🥵 Our first stop was to the Rocca Paolina, known as a medieval fortress. This was built into the hills in the 16th century for Pope Paul III in order to keep the Perugians under control.  In order to build this fortress, a medieval part of town was destroyed, and, during its construction, turned the former streets of the historic centre into below ground passageways, a bit like an underground shopping mall.  Over time however, the fortress was des...

  Sept 25 - Arezzo We started off todays visit’s with a tour of ‘Casa Vasari’, the family home of Arezzo’s favourite son, the painter, art historian, and architect, Giorgio Vasari.  Best known for his "Lives of the Artists" a biography of the the most famous artists of the Renaissance, Vasari personally frescoed all of the walls and ceilings here, and, although some rooms are more elaborate than others, overall they’re pretty special.  Unable to get into our next planned stop till this afternoon, we  took off for a walk around town with our first stop being the Piazza Grande.  Starting off as a medieval market place in the 13th century this attractive square is now the hub of the ‘old town’.  Similar in a way to Siena’s ‘square’, it’s surrounded by beautiful buildings, the groundwork is all redbrick, and there’s also a serious slope from one side to the other. It was a bit of fun watching the kids roll down the ‘hill’.  The fortress on the edge of tow...

  Sept 24 - Siena to Arezzo A travel day.  As Trenitalia, the train company, wanted to take us all the back up to Florence before bringing us back south again we decided that the bus was the best way to travel to Arezzo.  At half the time, half the cost, and travelling through some lovely rolling hills we didn’t regret it.  Arezzo, renowned for its frescoes, has a lovely old historic centre and this is where we went exploring after offloading our luggage.  Certainly not spectacular, like Florence or Siena, but nice in a Olde Worlde, not-showy off sort of way!  😊   There were a couple of nice churches we stopped in on our travels and were fortunate to see some frescoes by Piero and a rather dilapidated baptismal font by Donatello.  Planning to see a bit more of old town Arezzo this afternoon our plans got waylaid by the weather, or more correctly the rain.  Having managed to have a nice lunch sitting in the sun,  the heavens opened...

  Sept 23 - Siena   A real late start today, JEM was actually working! (although I’m not that sure that anybody really is at the top of their game for a 7:00 am ‘zoom’ meeting! 😆😳 ) Only next door to where we’re staying, our one and only visit today was to the ‘Civic Museum’ in the ‘Palazzo Pubblico’, the Town Hall.  Although not sounding particularly exciting the building, built in the 14th century, with it’s crenellated walls, an external chapel, and enormous tower, looks more like a castle.  It’s quite unusual on the inside as well as nearly every major room in the palace contains frescoes. Mainly depicting secular subjects, these were unusual for their time as they were commissioned by the governing body of the city, rather than by the Church.  Being part of the museum the ‘Tower’ was an opportunity not to be missed.  So, after about 400 very ‘iffy’ steps and some not so nice low ceilings, we were taking in some great views of the city and countrys...

  Sept 22 - Siena   An early start today to miss the day-tripper tour groups.  We’ve no idea where they’re from, Florence maybe?, cruise ships?, wherever!  they obviously don’t think Siena’s worth more than a few hours though, which is just lunacy!  Anyway, we started off today with a visit to ‘Il Facciatone’, ‘The Great Facade’.  This ‘Facciatone’ is probably the best spot in town for views of the city, cathedral, and countryside, and is the name given to the unfinished facade of a huge building project from the early 1300’s. This project was to expand the size of the ‘Duomo’ and envisaged that the current Cathedral should only represent the transept of the “new cathedral”!  Unfortunately though the ‘Black Death’ paid a visit and this put paid to any further work shortly after the construction of the facade.  Just alongside the ‘Facade’ is the ‘Museo dell'Opera del Duomo and this was our next stop.  The Museo is a museum housing artworks ...