Tuscany & Umbria

Greetings all,

My wife and I and a couple of friends are traveling to Northern Italy in
May & June. We have a week set aside to tour Tuscany & Umbria at the
end of our trip. I know that isn't enough time but what can you do?

Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in Sienna
before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two nights in
Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San Gimignano as well
as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for Cortona.

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions.

Rich Treakle

treakle wrote:
Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in
Sienna before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two
nights in Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San
Gimignano as well as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for
Cortona.

Hi, why not get an apartment for a week between Florence and Siena (both are
still in Tuscany) and then make day trips from there. Otherwise you are
packing and moving a lot in a very small area. It only takes an hour from
Florence to Siena so day trips are perfect. And staying in an apartment in
the middle (like in Castellina) would give you time to really enjoy the
area. And then for the Umbria and southern Tuscany part, why not stay in
Montepulciano and do day trips from there? I have a huge aversion to
switching places to stay as IMO it is a waste of precious time.

Cristina
--
Info on Moving to Italy and Driving in Italy
http://www.cristinasweb.com

"treakle" wrote in message
m...
Greetings all,

My wife and I and a couple of friends are traveling to Northern Italy in
May & June. We have a week set aside to tour Tuscany & Umbria at the
end of our trip. I know that isn't enough time but what can you do?

Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in Sienna
before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two nights in
Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San Gimignano as well
as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for Cortona.

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions.

Rich Treakle

Since you've already visited both Florence and Siena, I would advise you to
stay around the lago Trasimeno. The advantages are many like good pricing
and very central. F.i. Perugia, Gubbio, Orvieto and Spoleto are within good
reach and the scenery is beutiful to drive in.

Ronald

treakle wrote in news:0h3Pb.3548$vT3.2400
@newssvr29.news.prodigy.com:

Greetings all,

My wife and I and a couple of friends are traveling to Northern Italy in
May & June. We have a week set aside to tour Tuscany & Umbria at the
end of our trip. I know that isn't enough time but what can you do?

Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in Sienna
before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two nights in
Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San Gimignano as well
as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for Cortona.

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions.

Rich Treakle


As others have said you are moving more than necessary. The area is not so
large. On the southern end near Orvieto we stayed in Bolsena (primarily to
avoid the crowds of Rome after our flight and before a longer trip) we were
pleasantly surprised at a charming small town on a picture perfect lake and
still near enough to Orvieto and the Southern reaches of Tuscany and Umbria
(Bolsena itself and perhaps Orvieto are in Tuscia actually).

Having just visited Cortona and Bevagna, I would suggest
Assisi
Gubbio
Orvieto
in that order

cortona and bevagna are nice.. but much smaller.
"treakle" ha scritto nel messaggio
m...
Greetings all,

My wife and I and a couple of friends are traveling to Northern Italy in
May & June. We have a week set aside to tour Tuscany & Umbria at the
end of our trip. I know that isn't enough time but what can you do?

Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in Sienna
before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two nights in
Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San Gimignano as well
as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for Cortona.

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions.

Rich Treakle

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 05:46:36 GMT, treakle
wrote:


Anyhow, we will have spent four days in Florence and one night in Sienna
before our Tuscany/Umbria week begins. We're thinking of two nights in
Radda from which we can visit the Chianti region & San Gimignano as well
as Montalcino and Montepulciano before heading for Cortona.

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions.

Rich Treakle


Hire a helicoptor and fly over the places. That way you will be able
to make it to all those places on the list.

A drive through the Chianti region will take a full day. A drive down
to Montalcino, cross over to Montepulciano and return will take pretty
much a full day. Perhaps you will have time for lunch in Montalcino.

Being old and slow, we spent a week in the Chianti Classico area and a
week in Montalcino. Could have gotten by with less time in
Montalcino.

I forgot San Gimignano. Best catch that on the way down to Radda.
Just swing out a bit to the west, stop, run in, and run out.(no cars
in the town).

It is difficult to average 30mph in most of those areas when off the
Auto strada.

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 05:46:36 GMT, treakle
wrote:

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

Well, I hate to complicate your life, but I would suggest also seeing
Urbino, for its art and architecture but also for the pretty drive.
Urbino is in Le Marche, but easily accessible from eastern Umbria or
Tuscany.

I agree that you should probably split your time into two halves. In
the second five days base yourself somewhere along the eastern part of
Umbria and you can visit all of those places as day trips.
-----------
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

That's where my problems begin. We'll have five days & nights to spend
between Cortona, Assisi, Orvieto, Gubbio, Bevagna, etc. How do we
allocate that time?

Well, I hate to complicate your life, but I would suggest also seeing
Urbino, for its art and architecture but also for the pretty drive.
Urbino is in Le Marche, but easily accessible from eastern Umbria or
Tuscany.

I agree that you should probably split your time into two halves. In
the second five days base yourself somewhere along the eastern part of
Umbria and you can visit all of those places as day trips.

We stayed in Montefalco in Umbria. Very central to Assissi, Spoleto,
Todi, Perugia and Gubbio. Still near enough for day trips to Lago
Trasamieno (sp?), cortona, montepuciano and Orvietto.

We really liked Montefalco which on it's on is a pretty small hill
town with big wine and olive oil production. The town is quiet by
Italian standards and has a nice square with outside cafes.

Nancy

As others have said you are moving more than necessary. The area is not so
large.

The others are right. The area is not so large. And it takes up much time to
relocate and move from one hotel to another. So often staying in one spot is
best.

That said, it still takes a lot of time to do some of the drives in Tuscany and
Umbria. We stay regularly on the northern shore of lake Trasimeno. You can see
across the "val" to the mountains in the distance where Montepulciano sits. But
get in the car and it takes at least an hour to drive there.

In article ,
(Steltzjr) wrote:

As others have said you are moving more than necessary. The area is not so
large.

The others are right. The area is not so large. And it takes up much time to
relocate and move from one hotel to another. So often staying in one spot is
best.

That said, it still takes a lot of time to do some of the drives in Tuscany
and
Umbria. We stay regularly on the northern shore of lake Trasimeno. You can
see
across the "val" to the mountains in the distance where Montepulciano sits.
But
get in the car and it takes at least an hour to drive there.


I'm of two minds on this -- we have rented places near Siena, near
Cortona and near Perugia and then used them as a base to drive to towns
in the region -- this works well -- but if you get far afield e.g. we
drove out to Livorno or to the old towns north of Rome e.g. Sovana,
Pitigliano etc etc and this sometimes made for very long round trip
drives over winding little roads late into the night --

if we do it again, I think I would be inclined to meander from town to
town, finding small hotels for a day or two so we don't need to
backtrack and drive back home each night

While I think that hotel hassles are a factor and thus we spend a week
at a time in major cities instead of dashing from one to another --
this might not be the same big deal on a 'road trip' type meander from
village to village

anyone tried that and how did it work?