Best places to visit in Italy if you already live in Rome or Florence

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Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan… Amazing destinations packed with tourists, so bright that hide every competitor. The question arises: how could a foreign tourist decide to go somewhere else when planning a travel to Italy in front of such glorious names? Yet travellers should consider the option to discover another, more authentic face of Italy, choosing less resonant places, but actually not less touristy.

Orvieto, in Umbria, central Italy, is among them. Maybe one of the most visited places by roman and Florentine inhabitants, cause despite being a small town preserves some jewels that have nothing to envy to the Basilica of Florence or to the Coliseum but their fame.

So, the question to ask is another: why shouldn’t a foreign tourist prefer to go to a place like Orvieto before than Rome or Florence? Because…

Orvieto town of central Italy, is placed precariously on a cliff made ​​of tufaceous stone, to craggy porous limestone that seems imminently ready to crumble under the weight of the magnificent Gothic cathedral, symbol of the town, whose facade is decorated with a large series of bas-reliefs and sculptures. The archaeological excavations and the Etruscan temple of Belvedere witnessed its ancient origins: it is one of the twelve Etruscan city-state dating back to the eighth century BC, known by the name of Velzna. The current name comes instead from the subsequent designation of the Romans of Urbs Vetus (translated from the Latin "Old Town").

Its medieval and Renaissance period have left us, apart from the cathedral, numerous churches and palaces, but what intrigues the tourists is the famous Orvieto St. Patrick’s Well, carved into the tufaceous stone, with a depth of 53 meters and 248 steps. It’s a structure built between 1527 and 1537, by Pope Clement VII, fresh from the sack of Rome and eager to protect himself with water reserves in case of a siege of the city in which he had retired. Access to the pit, a masterpiece of engineering, is secured by two spiral one-way ramps, fully autonomous and served by two different doors, which allowed the mules to carry the water extracted, without obstruct and without having to resort to the only road leading to the village from the bottom of the valley. The well was named after St. Patrick because he remembered the cave that existed in the place (in Ireland) that now bears the name of the Purgatory of St. Patrick.

If you want to rent a car to visit this destination you can use Autoeurope international rent service