home villas brochure enquiry concierge last minute travel to Italy my wish list
Vacation in Italy: Umbria travel route
home: travel route: Umbria: unusual tours

unusual tours

Rich in history and in nature, Umbria offers the Falls of the Marmore, which are the highest in Italy; the sources of the Clitunno and Mount Subasio. The Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli and the Rocca Maggiore. The ancient city of Spoleto offers the Roman Theater and Druso’s Arch. Near Perugia, people can visit the Ipogeo del Volumni, which is an Etruscan tomb.

Fossil Forest of Dunarobba and Carsulae

Southern Umbria, Avigliano Umbro. The Fossil Forest of Dunarobba and Carsulae in the district of Avigliano Umbro stems from a natural phenomenon that allows us to admire, after millions of years, this open museum of fossilised tree trunks, exceptionally conserved in their original position. We are speaking about colossal plants, very similar to the modern sequoia, buried in clay and broken off at 5-10 metres high, capable of reaching a diameter of more than 1.5 metres.

Monteluco lake

The fascination of Spoleto stems not only from its monuments, but above all from the relationship with the nature that surrounds it. The Monteluco not only acts as a scenographic backdrop, but as a protagonist in the story of the city, with its forest of ilex protected since ancient times. At the close of the 5th Century it was also a natural place of isolation for hermits, for meditation and prayer. It offers many excursions and long walks in a countryside suited to the exaltation of the sanctity of nature. From Todi follow the SP451 towards Spoleto.

Clitunno Springs

From Spoleto continue on the SS3, coming off at Campello. A veritable natural jewel of Umbria, A veritable natural jewel of Umbria, the Fountains of Clitunno for the impression that they evoke, are the ideal place to comprehend the crossover between religion and the environment. Here springs of intense colour and luxurious vegetation create an environment of incomparable beauty. Dedicated to the God Clitunno, personification of the river where he spoke to his followers, already famous in the roman period and celebrated by Properzia, Plinio and Virgilio in their writings, this water has inspired in more recent times poets such as Byron and Giosuè Carducci, painters such as Corot and even today disgorges from cracks in the rock and gathers in a delightful pond.

The Oasis of Alviano

From Todi follow the SP448 towards Orvieto, come off at Baschi and follow the SP205 towards Alviano. The Oasis of Alviano was created in 1978 on an area of 800 hectares and included in the Parco Fluviale del Tevere (the Tiber Fluvial Park).
From 1990 the WWF has managed a wildlife reserve, in a context rich from the point of view of vegetation both riverside and marshland. Inside the oasis you can bird watch from positions on the towers, platforms with well equipped huts. There is even an open classroom right in the middle of the swamp.

The Marmore Waterfalls

From Todi follow the SS3 bis towards Terni-Rome, coming off at Terni, The Marmore Waterfalls are among the most remarkable and fascinating natural spectacles. It is a formidable work of Roman engineering made by the Roman Consul Manio Curio Dentato, who designed the drainage of the Velino swampland and had a canal excavated, called Cavo Curiano, at the point where today you find the main waterfall, channelling the still waters of the river. The waterfalls develop in three spectacular drops for a total of 165 metres (the highest in Europe), two equipped observations points allow visitors and tourists to observe the atmospheric and fascinating spectacle offered by the force of the water.

Umbria underground

Todi underground. The Roman cistern in Piazza del Popolo, over 5 Km of underground passages and tunnels, more than 30 pre-Roman, Roman and medieval cisterns and 500 wells of varying ages form the rich underground heritage of the city.
Perugia underground. Perugia below ground is accessible by means of mechanized paths through the structure of the Rocca Paolina, within the Rocca are the remains of the medieval quarter belonging to the Baglioni family. The fortress was built by Paolo III Farnese in 1540/43 based on a design by Antonio de Sangallo di Giovane. 5 kilometres to the south-east is the Hypogeum of the Volumni, a monumental tomb of the Etruscan Perugian family of the same name. The tomb, discovered in 1840, is one of the most important monuments of Etruria and is part of a much bigger necropolis known as Palazzone, which extends around the Hypogeum with numerous tombs and rooms from the archaic age (3rd and 1st century BC). The tomb is dated between the second half of the 2nd and the middle of the 1st century BC.
Orvieto underground is a labyrinth of caves dug out over a period of 3000 years from the rock on which the city is built. You can visit the Etruscan 'Velzna', medieval and Renaissance Orvieto in an extraordinary journey through time. A guided tour of Orvieto underground is therefore the best way to become acquainted with this new, particularly cultural aspect of a city rich in history and outstanding artistical treasures. Not to be missed, a visit to St Patrick’s Well designed by Antonio da Sangallo di Giovane.

Lazio, Umbria border. Bomarzo (Viterbo)

The park of Monsters of Bomarzo was devised by the architect Pirro Ligorio (he completed the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Rome after the death of Michelangelo and built Villa d'Este in Tivoli) on commission of Prince Pier Francesco Orsini, called Vicino, only to vent the heart broken at the death of is wife Giulia Farnese. The park was born in 1552 as 'Villa of Wonders' to be the only one of it's kind in the world. The Park of Monsters remained in oblivion till 1954 when it was bought by Mr Giovanni Bettini who with loving care has managed it. A visit to the park will unfold in a series of stages ranging between mythology and fantasy. The poet André Pieyre de Mandiargues wrote an essay devoted to Bomarzo. Niki de Saint Phalle was inspired by Bomarzo for her Tarot Garden.

Civita di Bagnoregio

Perched on top of a hill among some valleys Civita appears clinged to the edge of a cliff where it dominates the wide desolated valley made up of calanchi.
This isolation is the result of a continuous erosion that makes the tufa rock becoming thinner and thinner on an unstable layer of clay and sand altered by wind and rain. But when the town was founded by the Etruscans about 2.500 years ago, because of the different geological configuration, it was not so hard to get to Civita.
During the Etruscan period, in fact, it was an important city for its position along an ancient road connected to a dense network of trade routes.
In 1695 the beginning of Civita's decay was signed by a terrible earthquake which, causing serious damages to the roads and buildings, compelled many inhabitants to leave the city. The continuous seismic activities that followed in the course of the centuries, brought a long series of landslides; for this reason, Civita almost became completely desolated. Today, in fact, only a very small number of people live there who are determined to keep this little fragment of rock alive. Today Civita is an enchanted place, where time seems to have stopped. The complete absence of cars makes the atmosphere inside Civita even more unreal.


northern Umbria | southern Umbria | art | unusual tours | food and drink | sport & wellness | what to buy in Umbria | special events