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July 2, 2010
The Italian countryside by bike
A trip to Umbria is packed with ceramic crafts, history, sights and delicious cuisine.
MICHELLE DODEK
Usually people eat whatever they want on holiday because it just seems OK when on vacation. So, you pay for it when you return home ... that’s expected. Envision a trip to a country where the cuisine is delicious but there is no need to diet upon returning home. In fact, have two gelatos daily, eat pizza for lunch and pasta for dinner, along with a heavenly salad of pear, honey and pecorino. Don’t hesitate to indulge in a gigantic plate of tiramisu and a bottle of wine each night. Have you traveled to heaven? Almost. This is the life of a cycling trip in Umbria, Italy.
In mid-May, my husband, Daniel, and I embarked on an amazing trip to the Italian countryside. In store for us was a six-day self-guided cycling tour of the hilly countryside. Landing at midday in busy, noisy Rome, we took in as many sights as our jetlagged brains could manage and collapsed happily into bed.
The next morning, we hopped on the train to Perugia, the capital city of the region of Umbria. From there, we had to take a taxi to the nearby town of Torgiano, where we collected our bikes from Antonio and Carla, the support staff at the tour company. They let us know we could call them if we had a problem at any point along the six days of our trip but we would likely not meet again in person. Then, we all went for a hot drink to warm up as it was windy, overcast and approximately 12 degrees Celsius.
That afternoon, we put on all of our layers of warm cycling clothing and took a short ride to the pottery town of Deruta. British Columbia has one-industry towns for logging; Italy has towns full of handmade ceramics. Shop after shop with gorgeous handcrafted pieces decorated in the traditional majolica style of the region. On our bikes, we were limited in what we could purchase. One man, using the pantomime we became used to as non-Italian speakers, wanted to tape something to my back, but we opted for something smaller that would fit in the small case attached to my handlebars.
When we opened the wooden shutters in our room the next morning, sunlight streamed through the window. There was not a cloud in the sky. After indulging in the continental breakfast buffet, including chocolate croissants and strong Italian coffee, we were off on our first full day of riding. Our suitcases were to be taken for us to our next hotel so we had little to carry. All we had to do was pack a pizza for lunch, water and a set of precious directions. That day we rode about 60 kilometres through the bucolic countryside and the well-preserved towns of Assisi, Spello and to our final destination, Bevagna. The serenity of the rolling hills, vineyards and olive groves felt much more like a vacation to us than the craziness of our day in Rome.
We found Bevagna to be a little gem of a town. Only 5,000 people live in the walled medieval town. The interiors of the buildings may suit modern living but, together, the narrow streets and stone buildings create the illusion of traveling back a thousand years. We had a private walking tour of the town that included a look at the remains of a Roman bath that had an intricate and lifelike mosaic floor. As we always do when traveling, we inquired about a Jewish presence in the area, and our guide, Analita, relayed what she could.
Umbria is, and has been, an agricultural region. Any Jews that she knew of had been farmers and “well integrated.” She told of the efforts of local church officials to save the Jews in the area from the Nazis, who invaded Italy in September 1943. Apparently, with documents printed by a prominent Catholic family at the request of the priest, an Italian cycling hero rode around the countryside hiding the documents for Jewish families in the crossbar of his bicycle and distributing them undetected. With the help of their neighbors, the vast majority of the region’s Jews remained safe throughout the war.
According to historians, the political, social and economic history of the Umbrian Jewish community began in the second half of the 13th century, when Jewish settlement in the region became permanent, lasting until Jews were expelled from the region in 1569, as decreed by Pope Pius V. As such, the small towns of Umbria have not been hubs of Jewish life over the last few centuries, so we took the piece of Jewish history shared by our guide as the tidbit we would glean, and proceeded through the countryside on our bikes, soaking up the sun, ambience and enjoying the food. Each day, we traveled to a different, stunning hilltop town. Todi was followed by Orvietto and, on our last day, we went to the fantastic town of Civita di Bagnoregio. Each day, the sense of accomplishment that we had cycled from town to town, up hills the size of which that we had not previously attempted, made us feel fantastic.
We didn’t drink as much wine as we would have liked because the long days in the sun made us crave water far more than wine but, otherwise, we partook in the vegetarian food the local cuisine offered. From truffles to amazing cheese, the fresh and simple cuisine thrilled us. The medieval towns we stayed in captured our imagination and the food still holds our taste buds hostage.
We also came home fitter than when we left. What more can anyone ask from a vacation? The only thing we had to “pay for” when we returned was how much our kids missed us. It was well worth that price.
Michelle Dodek is a Vancouver freelance writer.
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