Feeling itchy and sweaty, scratched arms and legs, and hands pricked by thorns can all herald bliss: When you scramble up out of the woods, scratched hands clutching a big bunch of…
Read Article
Rural youth living near the tiny walled hilltown of Grello (pop. 45) run whenever they can these days. In serious training. But not for a a track meet. They’ll be running with…
With January 17th and the Feast of St. Anthony, Carnevale (Mardi Gras) took over here in Italy and will reign until martedì grasso (“fat Tuesday,” the day before the beginning of Lent…
“Buono come il pane” (“as good as bread”) is how the Italians describe a good-hearted, generous person. For the Greeks, bread was “the food of the gods”, for the Anglo-Saxons, “the staff…
I finally have my matera – or the traditional Umbrian bread cupboard. Many years ago, our farm neighbors, Peppe and Mandina, had decided to chop up Mandina’s old and well-used matera for…
Perugia is not just proud of its chocolate, Etruscan artifacts and the Umbria Jazz festival: this provincial capital of Umbria also boasts not just one but three patron saints! Legend tells us…
Our beloved San Francesco di Assisi might be revered as the patron saint of animals in other countries but certainly not here in Italy: Sant’Antonio Abate, 4th-century hermit saint who lived in…
What’s my favorite late fall day? The day or two when we pick our olives or the day the olio novello comes back from the mill? In every Umbrian farmhouse, stainless steel…
Our final tour together, the Rural Life Revisited tour, might have been the highlight of the Italy stay of this San Diego family. Chiarina won over little Van when she made us…
Acclaimed “la citta’ dell’olio”, Spello celebrates its “liquid gold” with the Festa dell’olivo e Sagra della Bruschetta every year in early December. Its 50th anniversary edition transforms this medieval hilltown gem into…