N and R were in Umbria

Umbria is the more practical, less visited neighbor of Tuscany. It is known for its medievil hill towns, of which we saw many, its picturesque country side, and for its truffles, wild boar, and proscuitto. Each was incredibly good (according to me).

We picked up the rental car in Rome - a Citron Picasso (its a boxy station wagon...a far cry from the alpha romeo i was hoping for) - and drove first to Assisi, burial place of St. Francis (established the Fransiscan order) and home to a cathedral in his honor, famous for its fresco'd interior. Assisi looked like this:

Our next stop was Spoleto, another hill town, which unlike Assisi is pretty functional...their medievil old city seemed to serve as a downtown for the surrounding modern city. It was nice to see such a historic and well preserved city that had not been gutted and turned into a tourist trap. There was also an amazing bridge built by the roman empire nearly 2,000 years ago; to appreciate its size, in the picture below that little black speck is me. Spoleto looked like this:

Our final Umbrian stop was the town of Norcia, in the Valnerina region of Umbria. It is near the northern end of the Apenine mountain range, and the drive to town was really nice. We drove part way up the snow capped Mount Sibilini before turning back, as the temperature during our drive dropped by 10 degrees (to below freezing) and the roads started to get a little scary. From the highest point we reached, if you looked out over one side it was green pastures and lush farmland, and over the otherside it was snow and looked like the dead of winter. The town itself is the culinary capital of Umbria, reknowned for their procsuitto and truffles. The dinner we had here was amazing...I never thought i'd get to enjoy a meal with truffles just crumbled right on top as if they were just a normal mushroom. Anyways, this was a really quaint town, and because it is pretty far from the bigger tourist stops like assissi, it had a nice genuine small town feel to it. Valnerina and Norcia looked like this: