After leaving Cinque Terre and saying goodbye to Hanna and Ken, we headed south to visit a city on a hill, Orvieto. Our good friends Paula and Warren recommended we stay a couple of nights there to rest and enjoy the charming town. Orvieto is a hillside town in the countryside of southeastern Umbria, Italy. The entire walled city center is built high on a volcanic butte and overlooks the beautiful valley below.

We arrived in the evening and were met by our Airbnb host, Enzo. He and his son kindly picked us up at the train station. They drove us up through the old Roman Gate and into the town center where we would be spending the next 3 nights. The apartment was beautiful and had all we needed to be comfortable.

A woman we met in Florence couldn’t understand why we chose to stay in Orvieto for three days. She actually said to us “what were you thinking“? She obviously has not spent any time there! We loved Orvieto! The Duomo is unlike any other we saw in Italy with beautifully painted frescoes inside and glittering mosaics adorning the facade. It is breathtaking. The city also has a underground tour that is fascinating and many deep wells that helped it survive a two year Roman siege back in the day. Everywhere you look while walking through this ancient town has something interesting to see. We enjoyed it all from the small windy cobblestone streets to the volcanic tufa rocks that the towering city walls are made of.

Of course we also met beautiful people. Like our host Enzo who went above and beyond to make us comfortable. And we will never forget Anthony, the guitar playing, old rock & roll loving, French owner of the Blue Bar around the corner. He let Ray borrow his extra guitar and they had a awesome jam session one night. The next night he asked me to sing with him! So fun! We even loved the elderly woman who sold us shoes who waved to us calling ‘buona sera’ as we passed her shop the next day. Good folks. Good memories. So happy we weren’t swayed away by the kind yet naysaying Florintine!