My name is Giovanna. As in Italy we are going into lockdown again, I was lucky enough to be able to travel with Walk About Italy team about 15 days ago to Umbria for a 3 day walking adventure.
Umbria is famous for being a wooded region. With my great surprise I discovered open, sunny valleys and hills, with olive orchards and Sagrantino grape vineyards with their yellow and red leaves as far as the eye could see: magnificent!
The villages we visited with Gianni and Roberto are all well kept, but authentic, without that patina of falsity that is sometimes noticeable elsewhere where flock of tourists go.
An episode revealed the kindness and hospitality of the Umbrians: on Sunday morning, during the walk, we arrived at the foot of a millenary olive tree. Gianni and Roberto had organized everything: the restaurateur we were going to have lunch with joined us with extra virgin olive oil bruschetta with freshly pressed oil and wine. A very pleasant surprise for the eyes, the soul and the palate.
It was a true joy to discover the black celery, of which I was unaware, cooked by Pietro, the restaurant owner that delivered the bruschetta few minutes before.
In the afternoon we continued our adventure with an excursion to the medieval town of Bevagna. We discovered Rita’s charm and skill in spinning and weaving silk as in the Middle Ages, with ingenious and very difficult to use machinery.
… and then a visit to the wax factory: a dark and perfumed cavern of aromatic wax, with hundreds of round, conical and twisted candles. Marco, so kind and so cute with his nice red hair, showed us how to pour the melted wax on the wicks to get candles. He tells us that he also does it to the children who visit him during the spring.
Well, what can I say, even Gianni, one of our leader and owner of the company, Homo sapiens with opposable and prehensile thumb, tried his hand at art, but he couldn’t even hit the wick. It seemed easy … but it wasn’t
