La Vita e Bella

This weekend I took a couple of day trips. On Saturday, I went on a school trip to Arezzo and Cortova. On Sunday, I took off on my own for Assisi and Perugia. I didn't have much time in each city so the descriptions are short and sweet.

Arezzo

If you’ve seen the movie “Life is Beautiful,” you should be familiar with Arezzo because most of the movie was filmed here.

I hate looking like a tourist when I visit these places, but you can’t escape it when you are walking in a line with 50 other googlely eyed people. We visited the most important church in Arezzo, the Basilica di San Francesco. Today, Arezzo is best known for the paintings by Piero della Francesca in the Basilica. It took 15 years to restore the paintings to match their original brilliance. Fortunately, after our visit to the church the chaperon let us break off.

Honestly, I didn’t think Arezzo had much going for it. Luckily, there were a bunch of garage sales going on.

We only had three hours in Arezzo, but it’s a small town so we covered most of it. We found a fortress and an old Roman Amphitheater.

We all managed to meet back at the bus on time except for two people. We were supposed to leave at 2:00 PM for Cortova, but this delayed us 15 minutes!

Cortova

If you’ve seen the movie “Under the Tuscan Sun,” you should be familiar with Cortova because most of the movie was filmed here.

We pulled into Cortova at 2:55 PM. I don’t know who plans these things, but we were told to meet back at the bus at 4:15 PM. That gave us about an hour and a half to explore the town. It figures, it ended up being one of the nicest towns that I’ve visited thus far.

Cortova is a gorgeous small hill town located 18 miles south of Arezzo. It’s considered one of Italy’s oldest towns. Olive trees and vineyards wrap themselves around the mountain and it’s beautiful -- Unfortunately, some guy was burning one of them?!

A bunch of us started walking on one of the main roads that led up the mountain. It was a really steep incline and I never thought it was going to end. Along the way, we lost a few people who couldn’t make it. We were exhausted when we finally made it to the top, but the view was magnificent.

Usually, every hill town has some sort of fortress at the top of it. Its purpose was to defend the city against enemies and intruders. The top of the hill gave them maximum vision and protection.

We really wanted to check out the fortress, but we couldn’t find a way to get in. We tried the old fashion way of knocking on the door, but that didn’t work. Then, we tried climbing the walls, but that didn’t work either.

So we gave up and hung out on a rock, taking in some great views.


By the time we climbed back down the mountain it was already 4:00 PM. We were really disappointed because we didn't have anytime to explore the rest of the city – the late people in
Arezzo screwed us!

Assisi

Assisi is famous for St. Francis, the patron saint of Italy. The famous 13th Century basilica was built in his honor. In 1926, the celebration of the 700th anniversary of St. Francis’s death brought more than 2 million visitors.

The train station is 2 ½ miles from town so I had to take a bus in. The first thing I found was the most important, the Basilica Di San Francesco. Actually, it’s not one church, but two. One was built on top of the other after St. Francis’s death.

The lower church is very dark and has low ceilings. I passed St. Francis’s tomb in the crypt below the main altar. The upper church is quite the opposite with high ceilings and large stained glass windows. It’s surrounded by paintings that depict the life of St. Francis.

I spent the rest of my time wandering the narrow streets and stopping into interesting places along the way. Assisi had an incredibly medieval appearance and the stone had a gorgeous pink/white tone.


I found an abandoned apartment and walked inside. I probably shouldn’t have, but I was curious. I was in there for 30 seconds before something startled me, so I ran outside real quick. Well, it ended up being noise from some guy jogging and when I ran outside I scared the hell out of him, lol, he jumped a few feet.

I left Assisi at about 2 PM and caught a train to Perugia (a 25 minute ride).

Perugia

If you’ve ever had a "Perugina chocolate," you should be familiar with Perugia because the chocolate is made here.

Perugia is also located on a hill so I had to take a bus from the train station. The streets are wide and the buildings are tall. In Italy, almost all businesses, stores, and restaurants are closed on Sundays. I made the mistake of coming to Perugia on a Sunday afternoon so practically everything was closed. There is one store that never closes in Perusia, the Perugina chocolate store! (I spent a lot of time in there)

A few of the museums were open, but the one that I wanted to check out was not - The Collegio del Cambio, which was a palace where many of the region’s famous bankers and money managers met to conduct business meetings. I spent the rest of the day walking around and taking pictures. I finished the night off with an amaretto gelato on a bench overlooking the Umbria valley.