Civita di Bagnoregio

jim,

One obvious places to visit would be Orvieto. It's a beautiful town with lots of interesting history. Ideally it would be good to spend at least one night there, as the "character" of the town is different when all the day-trippers have left. I believe there's parking down by the station, so the best idea would be to park there and take the Funicular up to town.

Parco dei Mostri in Bomarzo could be fun (we are going in August with visiting guests so no personal experience yet but friends highly recommend). I am also told Lake Bolsena is nice.

You could easily go to the coast, Monte Argentario and Porto Santo Stefano. From Porto S.S. you can ferry to Isola del Giglio.

There is a lovely drive between Montalcino and Montepulciano that encompasses Pienza and San Quirico D'Orcia that is worth doing. About 1 1/2 hours to Montalcino from Civita.

I visited Bolsena last year. Actually Ken (2 posts up) recomended that to me. We walked around for a couple hours. I enjoyed the town, it's well worth a stop.

Civita is south of, rather than central to, most of the hill towns that Rick's guidebook recommends, so that adds to your driving time for those options. But you will be closer to the Etruscan sites of Tarquinia and Cerveteri. As a beach destination, Monte Argentario and Porto Ercole look quite nice. You can drive to Assisi in about two hours each way or can take a train from Orvieto to Rome in one hour/ten minutes each way.