Day trip to Orvieto

 Well I’ll be honest. After our pouring rain day yesterday, last night Trev and I sat in the room wondering if we should still go for Orvieto today. They were calling for rain in almost every hour of the hour by hour forecast. And when we looked at the itinerary, there really wasn’t much to do to except enjoy the atmosphere of the little village. And if it poured the whole time there and we were stuck there for the entire day, would it just be miserable?  I looked up, things to do in Orvieto in the rain. But there wasn’t much. In the end, we decided to just go with it. 

Our train was quite early so we were out of the apartment at 7:30am. It’s the off season so while in peak season there are a lot of trains connecting Orvieto to Rome, in March you take what trains are available!

The hour by hour was looking a bit better, but still pretty sketchy and I was just hoping that the kids would like the town. Everyone had a really good sleep last night so that was good. After a 2 hour train ride we got dropped at the station and hopped on the funicular that takes you up to this Umbrian Hill own. Instead of catching the shuttle bus that takes you to the centre of town, Rick Steves had said it was worth a quick detour to the ruined fortress just around the corner and to just catch the next bus. So we went over. And the views were amazing!  The kids loved walking along the top of this amazing ruined fortress with the amazing views. Within 5 minutes Joel had declared that he was sure this was going to be one of our best days. He loved it. There are a lot of amazing sights in Rome, but the actual city is loud and bustling with traffic  and the metro is crowded and loud.  It’s not quaint and pretty.  Orvieto is the opposite.  It is quiet and so pretty and relaxing.  That’s definitely Joel’s vibe.

When were done with the views, the shuttle bus wasn’t there and we looked at how far the walk was.  Only 15 minutes!  We decided to walk  and I’m so glad we did!  It was a beautiful walk past all kinds of little shops and restaurants.  We were joking that since we got up and had breakfast so early that we really should stop for some breakfast gelato! 😂. When suddenly an English speaking couple stopped us and said, seriously if you want gelato go here. It is the best. The owner is amazing!  I said, oh did you just get some gelato. And they told us that they live here and go at least once per week. And the owner has a rock cover band. And they went to see him play last week. And as we were walking into the store they said, you have to try the affogato:  gelato with  a shot of espresso poured over it!  That cinched the deal for sure!  Soon enough we were eating 10:30am gelato! 😂 

They make all of their own gelato there and they had all of the standard flavours but they also had 3 special flavours  one was called Nonna’s Ravioli and it was in celebration of Carnivale.  It was strawberry and ricotta flavoured and some other flavours I forget.   We have seen the confetti on the ground in every single town we’ve been to.  the second kind was named after the restaurant: La Musa  it also sounded amazing but it had zambuca  🤮 They had one more special which was a nut flavoured one I think.

Anyways Trev and Joel got the affogato with the gelato they recommended for it which was the hazelnut  and owen and Anna and I just got different flavours one was I got the carnivale special.  This was the best gelato we have had  and the friendly owners and the fun of the affogato really put our day off to a fantastic start!

The 5 min of rain

Best gelato ever!

Once Owen learned that you could retire and move to Italy he decided that that Orvieto was where he was retiring and proceeded to look at the real estate posters to see how much it would cost to buy an apartment. The kids were very take. With Orvieto. By the way the town was very, very in crowded  so quiet  we had the place to ourselves!

After that we strolled up to the duomo and popped into some shops  the boys quickly found a shop filled with swords and armour and daggers and Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings.  The kids all had some souvenir money left to spend  we’ve mostly just passed tourist junk.  But the stores in Orvieto were MUCH nicer than others in other cities. Orvieto specializes in pottery and ceramics because the clay in the area is good for pottery.

We had to be at our reservation for our underground tour at noon  we went underground and it was good although probably not what we will remember from the day.  honestly, the views we could see of the valleys outside the caves were the highlight!  But we saw an olive press for making olive oil and pigeon coops .  The caves were dug by the Etruscan’s in 700 BC 😮 

After that we were starving.  First restaurant we tried didn’t have a table for all of us.  The second was completely empty but very highly rated and so we went there.  It was very cute.  The waiters were excellent.  I noticed that they had an olive oil tasting for 2 euros on the menu ($3)  We ordered that and they brought us 2 kinds of olive oil  the guy told us to drizzle it on the bread and then grind some salt onto it  it was so delicious  they Kept bringing more bread, even when we had our meal.  We ended up eating 3!baskets of bread with the amazing olive oils!  Anna and Owen ordered gnocchi (meat sauce for Owen and 4 cheese sauce for Anna)  I got a sage and olive oil ravioli and it was by far my favourite meal of the trip.  I savoured every bite! Orvieto is known for their wild game and Joel got a wild boar stew that he said was really good! 🐗 Trev got a steak and salad.  excellent lunch!  And I almost forgot that Trev and I had the Orvieto wine with it!

After that we all had seen things we wanted to buy  Anna had seen a Jellycat lion stuffy she wanted.  Joel wanted a lord of the rings ring  Owen wanted an Orvieto hoodie.  Joel wanted one too but they didn’t have any big enough for him.  And I wanted a ceramic Christmas ball!  Oh and because we had such fun with the olive oils, we found 2!different olive oils in 100mL containers that we can take in our carryon home with us!

Posing with the wild boar he just ate!

The boys were like kids in a candy store in here!

Joel’s souvenir - Lord of the Rings ring

Playing with the ring

All the kids love this lemon pop. It’s very sour!

Lots of kitty cats in Orvieto!

Owen’s Orvieto hoodie

Owen with his new wallet

Anna with her new lion stuffy

After that we did the Rick Steves walk through Orvieto (dont tell the kids  they are sick of stick Steves walks!)  Trev and I just quietly read the walk while we walked down the streets and the kids enjoy Iles the quaintness of the city while trying to big each other ;)  And it ended at the city wall with the best views!

We walked all along the walls and it was amazing.  Then it took us back I to the city.  Now we had said that we were going to try to eat gelato every day in Italy.  Unfortunately, if you were keeping track, there was one day in Florence where ‘gasp’ we did not eat any gelato!  The day just got by us and at one point we said we’d stop on our way back to our Airbnb and the kids enjoy we did t pass any gelato places (surprising!).  So the kids have been bothering us to do two gelatos in one day to make up for it.  It’s sort of been a running joke.  Well today was the day! 😂  we knew we had to pass the amazing gelato place that we went to in the morning.  This time they had a brand new mango gelato flavour, just made!  Trev and Joel got affogato again, this time with their specialty flavour.  We got it to go while we walked to the funicular.  

 The train left at 5:30pm and we got back to Rome at 7:35pm .  A young  Italian guy saw me out my backpack on my front while we got back to our metro stop and said, oh good. You really need to watch on the metro.  It’s really bad. I said, yes I know we all are being careful. He said:  sorry. Rome is great but the metros are not. Then he asked where we are from and we said Canada and he said:  oh boy. Please watch out for Donald Trump. He is very near. 😂 

It was 8pm and we hadn’t had dinner yet.  We ended up finding a highly rated place (thanks trip advisor) a block away from our hotel.  Really yummy!  We haven’t attempted a pizza every day rule but I will look back on our pics  I think we maybe have eaten pizza every day!  Trev actually bought a burger tonight but ste some of Anna’s pizza that she couldn’t finish so kept up his pizza streak.  The food here has been a real highlight  so many excellent and memorable meals!  Other than our takeout kebab night last night I would give every single meal high marks.  It really adds to the trip.  In Costa Rica it was absolutely a fantastic trip and the food wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t a highlight L.  The kids look forward to every meal here!

We’ve noticed they have the same 8 pizzas everywhere and nothing different.  And not really any make your own options  a couple of times I’ve ordered the diabolical pizza (cheese pizza with spicy salami) and asked them to add things to it  o asked them to add mushrooms one time  add olives another time  and tonight I got them to add olives and red onions  I wonder if they think I’m really weird?

And of course we stopped at cornettoland for breakfast!  The guy had this giant automatic Nutella tub that he used to fill our croissants when we bought them!

4 of us crammed in our teeny elevator. Despite the fact that our room is in the 5th floor (6 flights of stairs) either Joel, Owen or Trevor (sometimes more than one) choose to sprint up the stairs after getting home for the day rather than waiting for the elevator to take a second trip. This is after 23,000 steps. They are crazy!

PS: it rained for a total of 5 minutes tofay and that was all!! :)

23,000 steps today!!