As you head through the arched medieval entrance of hilltop castle-village, Collemancio, you’ll probably see an elderly lady in black, ubiquitous gold chains draped around her neck, sitting in her chair along…
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Every year for Corpus Domini (60 days after Easter), over seventy stunning floral tapestries carpet piazza and winding alleyways of medieval hilltown gem, Spello, fruit of months of flower-gathering and then all-night…
I remember the year that a tour guest summed up our walk through Spello on Corpus Cristi (60 days after Easter) this way: “Seeing the Infiorate should be on the cover of…
I’ve been told by more than one that you can’t truly feel the passione for the Ceri unless you join in carrying one of the three mammoth pyramidical structures, called “candlesticks.” Said…
As you walk through Assisi’s main square these days, you’ll hear metal clanging as workers set up the grandstands. Posters of medieval personages adorn Assisi notice boards. Blue and red flags flutter…
La Festa della Vernaccia is celebrated in the tiny walled Umbrian town of Cannara just after Easter for this treasured dessert wine is intertwined with Easter in local tradition. The cannaresi traditionally…
While leading his long-horned oxen and playing his organetto, Peppe de Lillo sang le pasquarelle (traditional mountain verses) in harmony with a tambourine-player, launching Cascia’s “Festa delle Tradizioni Rurali”. Medieval hilltown, Cascia,…
According to legends, a myriad of la Madonna images have miraculously arrived in Italy from the sea. No one knows when the venerated Byzantine Madonna Greca image arrived in Isola a Capo…
Rolling around in huge metal bins over hot coals, chestnuts pop in the night in the medieval backstreets of Arcidosso, Tuscan mountain village. When the husks slip loose on the roasted chestnuts,…
A recent guest, Barbara put it this way: “Your farmhouse apartment is spacious, clean and well-appointed: a lovely retreat after a day of touring.” Barbara, delighted to host you and Brad in…