Savages in Italia: Montefalco

Before I start, I want to let you know that we had a great visit with Caroline's parents. She will post about that soon. I'm going to skip ahead and write about last weekend.

Hey there, everybody. The school year is ending, and we are finding ways to get out and enjoy the nice weather and the countryside. Along those lines, this past weekend two of the American faculty who are my faithful cycling companions, Rolf and Chris, and I rode into Umbria to Montefalco where Caroline, Eli and Ashley, another American teacher here, met us. The ride was 108km through some of the most beautiful countryside that central Italy has to offer. For those who are curious to check out the route you can google map the directions from Viterbo to Montefalco and click the "avoid highways" box. We rode through several picturesque medieval hill towns, green valleys, vineyards, olive groves, etc. It was really incredible. This is the longest ride I have ever done, and I was pretty psyched when we rolled into Montefalco after 5+ hours on our bikes.

When we got to Montefalco, we showered and headed out to the town for an amazing lunch outside on the main piazza. Of course we sampled a bottle of the local DOCG red, Sagrantino. This is one of our favorite wines in Italy, and this bottle was especially good. After lunch we hung out on the piazza and took in some rays. A brief visit to the tourist office informed us that the following day was Umbria's "Cantine Aperte." Basically, wineries all over Umbria were opening their doors for tastings accompanied by food and in some cases entertainment. We all agreed that our fate was sealed for the following day and headed back to the inn to nap or in our case, watch Eli run around for three hours. Dinner that night was nice, but I was absolutely exhausted. We got to bed early having spent a truly spectacular day in Umbria.

After breakfast the next morning we headed out to check out what this Cantine Aperte thing was all about. The deal with the Cantine Aperte is that each person buys a glass for 5 euro, and the glass comes with a pouch for carrying it around your neck. That glass will get you tastings and food at any of the two or three dozen vineyards in Umbria that were participating in this event. The proceeds went to charity. Anyway, we headed to the first vineyard of the day (at 10:45 am), Perticaia, whose Sagrantino we had tried at lunch the day before. This was a beautiful place just outside of Montefalco. They were serving porchetta (a very tasty roasted pig, a regional specialty), local pecorino, local prosciutto, and crostini with local olive oil. They labeled each food with the appropriate wine pairing. Everything was incredible, the wine, the food, and the views. After an hour or so there we headed in the car for a brief tour of the area during which Eli fell asleep. We ended up at another Sagrantino vineyard outside of Gauldo Cattaneo. We successfully transfered the sleeping cherub into his stroller and proceeded to check out the scene at Scacciadiavoli.

This vineyard had a very different feel and a lot more people. The food and the wine here did not let us down. We all sat around amazed at our good luck for happening upon this great wine tasting event, awed by the beauty of our surroundings, and generally ecstatic about being in Italy and doing things like this. The ride back was crowded (the three bikers were now in the car with Ashley, Caroline and Eli) but scenic. We retraced the route we had rode the day before and relived our feelings of euphoria as we remembered each hill, each field, and each town we passed on our bikes.

This was a truly memorable weekend, and if there are any bikers out there I highly recommend that you come here and do something like this. Preferably with me next year. Italy by bike is a phenomenal experience. I will miss sharing it with Chris and Rolf, but I hope that others will come to take part next year. Here are some pics:

Above: Caroline and Ashely at Scacciadiavoli in Gualdo Cattaneo. Notice the pouches for the wine glasses. Brilliant!
Below: the two of us at Scacciadiavoli