Spoleto

31 October – 03 November 2019

We made a longer drive this time. 4.5 hours total from Vicenza to Spoleto.

Halloween

We arrived in Spoleto on Halloween. Before dinner we took a long walk and followed all the parents who followed all their kids as they headed to high-yield candy-givers. This holiday has picked up in Italy over the past years. We saw only hints of it on prior trips. Now the little kids get dressed in traditional costumes—mostly witches, goblins, skeletons, and ghosts. The parents are right there with them. Unlike in the US, the kids in Italy go to shops for candy. No going to homes. This is nice because the businesses are mostly small and local, giving the kids lots of opportunities for gathering candy. It is also nice because it further enlivens the retail streets and keeps the holiday geographically focused. Makes it an urban celebration. There were lots of small kids racing around shrieking on a sugar high.

One on the fun parts of travel is stumbling onto celebrations like this. In Spoleto we scored a hat trick: Halloween, a three-day weekend for All Saints’ Day, so there were lots of Italian visitors in town, and a three-day dessert festival, captured below.

Festival of the Two Worlds

Spoleto is known primarily as the host to the Festival dei Due Mondi, a two-week summer festival of performing and visual arts plus discussions on science. Giancarlo Menotti began it in 1958. The Spoleto Festival USA is held in Spoleto’s sister city Charleston, South Carolina. Menotti’s intent was to highlight the talents of up and coming artists from both sides of the Atlantic. The two festivals have splintered, although there are talks about reuniting.

Spoleto’s festival brings in loads of visitors and has prompted other events in the city that now include jazz and opera. Menotti chose Spoleto partly because of its proximity to Rome and easy access by train and because it had several suitable theaters. In 1962, they also staged an ambitious international outdoor sculpture exhibition with 53 artists. Some of their work is still in place today. including Calder’s monumental piece in front of the train station.

The Town

We enjoyed Spoleto. This fairly untouristy city of 38,000 is located in the Province of Perugia, in Umbria. Like most medieval towns (you remember them, don’t you?) it is on a hill and still has fragments of its ancient Roman and medieval walls. A large fort with walls intact dominates part of its skyline.

Like other towns in the area, Spoleto dates back to at least the 5th century BC when it was settled by a local tribe. And its history is much like other towns nearby. It was attacked by Hannibal, allied with Rome, taken over by Rome, invaded by Lombards, recognized as an independent state, made part of the Holy Roman Empire and then the Papal States, was conquered by Napoleon, and ultimately surrendered to Italy’s unification. Hard to keep up? Yep!

A retail street winds down steeply from the higher points in the city to the lower levels of the town. A clever series of inconspicuous elevators and moving sidewalks make the climb back up easier. There are three routes, with two leading to large parking structures at the edge of town. We left our car in one of them.

The weather has been getting chilly and rainy, so tourist season has ended. That means plenty of lovely apartments are available, some at astonishingly low prices. Bonnie splurged a tad on VRBO and we found ourselves in an elegant two-bedroom, three-bath apartment, clearly decorated by a professional, with a stunning view, fireplace, and elaborate kitchen. A nice surprise.

It would be fun to come back to Spoleto for the festival.

Wanderings

We arrived on Halloween.
A busy piazza five minutes from our apartment
The street of our apartment.
View from our balcony. Not bad.
Almost right
Street art
For JIM W. and CARL S.: Power strip.
We took a 50-minute tour of Spoleto. The city street pattern is quite confusing so this gave us some orientation.
Aqueduct that supplied water to the town at one time.
Roman theater still in use
Roasted chestnuts—tis the season.
Cafe in the library courtyard. Robert went here several times for his morning cappuccino and cornetto. Alcohol is also available.
Underground moving sidewalks
Sketch material
SIG: Your people holding a mushroom exhibition.

Rocca Albornoz

CHUCK: Another note for you.

Cathedral de Santa Maria de la Asuncion

This piazza and stairway are filled with several thousand people for the final concert of the annual Spoleto festival.
Palazzo Collicola art museum
Sol LeWitt
Two-dimensioned Richard Serra
Calder

Dolci d’Italia

Timing is everything. There was a three-day festival of sweets with vendors from all over Italy.

Cibo e bibite

Next Stop—Rome!

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