The Country Home in Umbria

For the May day holiday, we decided to take advantage of a travel deal we found and stay in country for the long weekend. Waking early to beat the rush of traffic (Milanese are dying to leave Milan on normal weekends - long weekends are even worse), we loaded Cooper into the car and set the Tom-Tom towards Orvieto, Umbria.

The weather was definitely in our favor. We stayed at an agriturismo about 25 minutes from the town of Orvieto. An agriturismo is basically a government-subsidized farm. Part of the program means that these still-working farms or vineyards receive government funds if they lease out rooms or homes on part of this property. Our agriturismo owned several acres in the region and rented out a two bedroom stone house to us and our accompanying friend. Our friend's husband was out of town but she brought her two boys anyways and everyone seemed to enjoy watching the kids chase Cooper around the open yard.

While the Umbrian countryside is dotted with charming medieval towns, we spent most of our time at our rented home. We took some long walks with Cooper and spent a lot of time relaxing and reading in the fresh air.

Our agriturismo sponsored a wine tasting on Saturday afternoon that we happily attended. We toured their wine-making facility and tasted their four local wines, enjoying the crisp white Grechetto so much that we brought home four bottles. Mark is becoming a snob, he later remarked that he was unimpressed since we've gotten much more thorough tastings and tours in the past.

While lunch the prior day had been at the agriturismo's restaurant (fantastic deal and amazing food) and dinner had been made in our own kitchen in front of the fire, we headed into old town Orvieto for dinner on Saturday. Orvieto is built on top of a tall mountain and I'm sure this was of great use in defending the town - you could see for miles. We had a delicious dinner of fresh pasta followed by a steak with balsamic sauce - steaks from the Umbrian/Tuscan region are deservedly famous.

And speaking of famous, we even spotted a celebrity out while out at dinner! The restaurant's owner was serving us and paused to ask how we'd heard of his restaurant. It was truly word of mouth from a friend in Milan but when we asked why, the owner was practically popping with pride as he announced that Rick Steves was interviewing him back in the kitchen. I had to see it for myself so I popped back and came face to face with the famous tour guide. While I've always been more of a 'Lonely Planet' girl myself, I'll have to flip through the 2010 or 2011 Rick Steve's Italy guide to see if the Trattoria dell'Orso made the cut.

We were sad to wake up early on Sunday and make the drive back into Milan. The six hours to Umbria was a little long but the weekend in the country was amazing and we've now resolved ourselves to find a piece of this countryside paradise a little bit closer to home.