mail: Bill Thayer

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Umbria: the 92 Comuni

A region of central Italy: 8456 sq. km. 2003 population: 834,000. Capital: Perugia.
— and around the map, some of my favorite places, repeated.

My six stays in Umbria have totalled so far only about fifteen months — but Umbria is still the part of the world I know best: since 1993 I've walked something like 2000 km of the countryside, almost always with a camera. Inevitably then, this site is, at least potentially, one of the best Umbrian resources online.

I've visited every one of the 92 comuni. On the map above, each one links to an orientation page, and often quite a bit more, depending on just how much work I've done on the formal side of the site: currently (Dec 09), the best-developed subsites are Spello and Trevi each with 42 pages (and 159 and 104 photos respectively). Even where I may not have got round to writing an in-depth site, though, the orientation page links to my diary, where there is often a fair amount of additional information and photos. As of Mar 11, my Umbrian site as a whole runs to 660 webpages, not counting translations; my diary to a couple hundred pages more. In addition, each orientation page includes an index of other people's sites, so the map in front of you is the single most comprehensive source online for Umbria, because almost none of those other sites link to each other. (If you're having trouble finding a particular place on the map, you can also navigate to it from this alphabetical index.)

Places shown as are larger towns or cities.

Places shown in red are those I specially like. (Here, I had to be pretty selective, else the whole map would be bright red.)

In addition to the places shown and linked on the map — all of the region's 92 comuni or townships — a few other places, not comuni, are worth noting for their beauty or historical interest; and also because people often know their names without knowing what comune they might be in:

Those of you planning a trip to Umbria, especially without a car, and wondering what your best base might be, will benefit from this discussion of the question, with map, of course.

This site also includes detailed information on train stations and accessibility for each of the 92 comuni — just how steep is each of these beautiful hilltowns, anyway? — and by and by, this non-driver will scrounge up a bit more information on parking; all of it here.

If you're interested in walking the countryside, which is how I got to know Umbria, your main resource will be my unimaginatively titled page, Walking in Umbria, where you can take in at a glance a map of the entire region, with each of my walks plotted out on it. Each plot in turn includes a summary description (traffic, scenery, other practical points) and a link to the walk as I recorded it in my diary.

If you are less interested in modern than in ancient roads, I've made a fair start on the Via Flaminia; this important Roman road is covered in about 25 pages and 60 photos over its entire length from Rome thru the Lazio, Umbria, the Marche to Rimini in Emilia-Romagna. I'm still working on it, so expect a bit of "construction" and continuing additions and improvements.

More generally, I've collected on a single orientation page, with links as appropriate, all the information I have on Roman remains in Umbria.

Umbria is well known for its many churches, some few of them going back to Roman times, many of them Romanesque, many of them with beautiful frescoes or sculpture. For those who prefer a topical approach to this important side of Umbria, I am continuing to develop my Churches of Umbria site: in May 2012, the site covered 453 churches in 289 pages and 1133 large photos, plus 31 wayside shrines (edicole, often madonnine) in 24 pages.

Finally, if you read Italian, the first instalment of what I hope will be a series of useful texts; this one, a 120‑page book on three Umbrian towns, with 105 photographs: Giulio Urbini's Spello, Bevagna, Montefalco.

Umbria is essentially a rural region; the icon I use elsewhere, as in the navigation bars at the foot of the page, to indicate this part of my site is a photo of a stone table — and a chicken discreetly seeking the shade — in someone's garden a couple of miles SW of Todi.

Images with borders lead to more information. The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)
UP TO:	Italy	Home			SEE ALSO:	Diary
OFF SITE:	The official sites — the Region of Umbria and its two Provinces:			Regione Umbria	Perugia Province	Terni Province
	General sites on Umbria, most with individual pages for most or all of the comuni. Mind you, each of my own pages for the individual comuni links directly to the corresponding comune pages on these sites, so this isn't the last you'll see of them:
	Umbria.org	Umbria 2000	BellaUmbria	ArgoNet
	Umbria Online	PrimItaly	ItalianVisits.Com	ParadoxPlace	Mediasoft
	These next sites are diaries and trip reports, usually by one-time visitors; they are often very good guides to what places are really like.
	Bill Thayer's Diary	Allan Nelson's Bike Trips	Zanetti Trip Diary	TheTravelzine	Kate & David's Gap Year
	Finally, a miscellany of specialized or topical sites that might be useful to you. They often contain more information than you might think:
	Bike in Umbria	Mauro's MBike (Terni province: bike itineraries)	Brigolante's Guide to Walking in Umbria	Medioevo in Umbria (medieval sites)	IGM Maps of Umbria
	FCU (Umbrian Railway)	APM   (bus line)	ATC   (bus line)	SSIT   (bus line)	Sulga   (bus line)
	Camper Club Umbria (camper parks)	Camper Web Perugia province (camper parks)	Camper Web Terni province (camper parks)	Camping Italy (camper parks)
	Umbria Sagre (festivals and food)	To Do In Umbria (events, sagre)	Centro Agro-Alimentare (food products)	ExpoUmbria (business information)
	Catholic Church: Dioceses and Parishes	Catholic Bishops' Conference	La Voce	Caritas Umbria	Radio Umbria (live feed)
	Elenco Online (official phonebook)	InUmbria Online (daily webzine)	Museums of Umbria	Museums of Terni province
	Alberghitalia (hotels)	Atletica in Umbria (participant sports)	Corriere dell' Umbria (Umbria's newspaper)	Osservatorio A. Bina (earthquakes)	FamilySearch   (genealogical records)
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