About a 9 hour drive from the Haute Savoie is Todi in Umbria. Todi is about half way between Perugia and Terni, or Orvieto and Spoleto. Umbria is in the middle of Italy in the most beautiful countryside with an abundance of hilltop and medieval villages and towns. Not to mention fabulous restaurants, wonderful food, delicious wines and incredible olive oils.
Fun fact Umbria is the only region of Italy without a coastline!
Deep in the beautiful Umbrian countryside, near Todi in Italy, we discovered a hidden treasure. The wonderful olive farm of Passo della Palomba really is a taste of paradise and certainly a taste of some of the best olive oil that Italy has to offer. This delightful 19th century estate has been expertly and lovingly restored by Alessandro and Claudia Gilotti and their sons. The restoration took 4 years using original materials to retain its former glory. Now at Passo Della Palomba you can enjoy a peaceful holiday in this tranquil location.
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A profusion of bright colours from their flowered headdresses rush towards me. The large brass bells clanging and glinting in the early morning sunlight setting off their huge brown eyes.
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I’ve really enjoyed looking back on my highlights of 2018 and all my travel and eating experiences. People I’ve met, foods I’ve tasted and amazing sights I’ve seen. I visited six Countries and made 26 different trips in 2018.
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Celebrated in Geneva this weekend 7-9 December 2018
A history of The Escalade: Festival of the Chocolate Pot celebrated in Geneva – A commemoration of the defeat of The Duke of Savoy and his army
Each year in the second week of December, Geneva in Switzerland comes alive with the sound of revolution. Fife and drum bands march the cobbled streets of the Old Town.
What an enjoyable day out this was to see The Villas of Benicassim. Along the Orange Blossom Coast or Costa del Azahar in Spain is a wonderful beach resort with 6 kms of sandy beach all linked by a promenade. Along the beach front promenade walking from the Hotel Voramar there are beautiful traditional villas with an amazing history of the highlife of the arts and theatrical society of the 1920’s. The 27 prominent villas all with lush green gardens and built in a French villa style have a romantic look and maintain their traditional style.
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I cannot believe that I have lived in the Geneva area for 9 years and had never taken this great day trip on the wonderfully picturesque lake – Lac Leman, one of the largest lakes in Western Europe. Lac Leman or Lake Geneva as it is also known is a crescent shaped lake with a shoreline in both France and Switzerland and is overlooked by the Alps.
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What’s a Puntarelle you ask…this was a new for me too! It is a salad ingredient from the chicory family and seems to be unique to Italy. It is sometimes known as asparagus chicory and indeed when a local at a nearby table could see me trying to work it out with the waiter in a mixture of broken French, Italian and English, he stepped in and said this is similar to asparagus.
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Well what a fine day out! I know that Italy is not part of the Savoie but up until around
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Last week I visited the Ariana Museum, Geneva for this Food exhibition of artworks, installations and photography. So this post
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