Any reccomendation for a good central location in Tuscany or Umbria for renting a house/villa/apartment? We want to do some daytime travel to different towns. We want somewhat private -- but we also want to be close enough to a town for food, restaurants, etc.
Unfortunately the best time for this trip will be late June/early July. We'll just have to work around the crowds.
I think we would like a house/farmhouse with a garden/pool for relaxing when we want to take a break and in the evenings. We are traveling with our sons (ages 21 and 12) and a niece (22)(all pretty experienced travelers). We'll get some city time in Rome and Florence, so the college kids will have some city excitement during the trip. In addition they will be staying in Europe for their own travels after the parents/kid brother head home!
I'd just like to be able to find a base for getting to some great spots (Sienna, Assisi, for example) without spending huge chunks of time each day in the car.
Yes, we do plan to have a car.
Thanks!!
One company I'm familiar with that caters to people such as yourself is:
Untours
They have rentals in both Tuscany and Umbria, as well as much of Europe, and specialize in helping you get started.
An Agriturismo is fine if all you want is a room. But if you want privacy, and a place to yourself, check to see what Untours has available.
Check out la-fonte.com. It's a renovated farmhouse in Tuscany with 4 self-contained apartments to choose from - we had a 2 bedroom, 2 bath with a full kitchen. It lists its address as San Gimignano but really it's closer to Certaldo, where you can find a gas station, grocery store, pharmacy, restaurants, etc and the best pizza we had in Italy. If you take the funicular up to the old town, you get a great view of the area including the town of San Gimignano and more options for dining and shopping. We found it a great base for touring the area. The grounds are really lovely with places to sit, a wonderful outdoor swimming pool and off the road parking.
Hi Jayne - My choice for years has been -
http://www.casolarelibbiano.it/
Located directly outside of San Gimignano and close to Siena and Volterra , Berta and her husband Andrea have a Beautiful property as you will see by checking out their website. It's only about three miles to San Gimignano and an excellent base for exploring the region.
Ciao, Greg
Jayne,
This will give you some ideas http://www.slowtrav.com/italy/tuscany/hs_planning.htm
Since the original post was for "central location", "Tuscany and Umbria", and maybe an adequate town, Perugia would cover the usual Tuscan hill towns and make Assisi and the rest of Umbria convenient. The problem being, of course, is that you get so interested in Perugia that you forget to go anywhere else. Since it's more of a city than a town, you could probably find what you're looking for there.
Hopefully you do plan on renting a car. We did so in October and found St. Albino near Montepulciano a good base for exploring Tuscany.
We used Perugia as our base for Umbria but it didn't work out as well for us. We stayed in the central part of the city so parking and traffic make it a challenge to easily get in and out of the city for day trips. Perugia was probably our least favorite city in the region. I might consider Cortona or Spello as a base for Umbria.
