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If you’ve never thought about putting a visit to Umbria on your Italian itinerary, do it now! The Italian countryside is a beautiful place, filled with medieval cities, amazing scenery, great wine, and rustic food. There are a variety of accommodation options to choose from in Umbria, depending on your preference: agriturismo, traditional hotels, bed and breakfasts, and even castles!
This post is about our stay during our visit to Umbria at Castello Valenzino, a castle B&B located in Umbertide (pronounced oom-ber-tee-day). Be sure to read through to the end to find out if it was a worthwhile experience!
Location of Castello Valenzino
Castello Valenzino is a little off the beaten path, nestled among beautiful, rolling hills, just north of Perugia. You will need to rent a car to make it to Castello Valenzino. We rented our car in Florence to make the roughly two-hour drive down to Umbria. Driving really is the best way to enjoy the Italian countryside!
The towns in Umbria are pretty spread out, so public transportation will be difficult to get you from place to place. Italy is such a beautiful country, and driving your own car means traveling at your own pace. You can take it all in at your leisure!
The location of Castello Valenzino makes day trips to towns such as Gubbio, Perugia, and Assisi easy, with all of them just being a little over a half hour drive away. Also nearby are Lake Trasimeno and the lake town of Castaglione del Lago. There are so many towns close by that are worth exploring, it’s hard to choose!
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Being in such a remote location was something a bit different for us. We usually prefer to stay in town so that we can have things within walking distance. Our room did not have a kitchen or kitchenette, so we had to eat out for each meal (not that I’m complaining about finding new places to fill my tummy up with delicious Italian eats!).
Restaurants Nearby
The closest restaurant to the castle is about five minutes down the road at the Antognolla Golf Course called Il Caldaro. This actually ended up being a really good find! I highly recommend a visit (or two) there.
Just be careful at night – the map apps give you some strange directions to get there. If you are traveling at night, it is extremely difficult to see the sign to turn off the road. It gets very dark out there in the country and the cars are going really fast, both oncoming and behind you! I think we passed the road like four times before we were able to finally (and safely) make it.
If you don’t visit Il Caldaro, you are best off trying to grab dinner at one of the many cities or towns you might be exploring that day. Otherwise, I would recommend driving into Umbertide to grab a bite, like we did on our first night. Tankard Pizza Tavern was our saving grace of the day where we filled up on pizza and wine. It’s a great recommendation for affordable, easy, late night eats. Thank goodness for pizza taverns!
Arrival at the B&B
This is very important: you must let Castello Valenzino know an approximate arrival time for your check in. They do not have staff on the premises 24/7 that can get you settled into your room and we learned this the hard way. We arrived at approximately 7:00 p.m., after a long and stressful day of train and car travel, with only an hour left to check in (check in is available only until 8:00 p.m.). In fact, we nearly missed one of our train connections in Pisa due to a delay and thank goodness we made it; otherwise, we would have been sleeping in the car!
Story time…
There is a front gate to enter the property and when we arrived, that gate was closed. After several failed attempts to reach the manager using the intercom system at the gate, I somehow reached one of the guest apartments. An extremely nice English man named Philip walked out in his pajamas to let us in the gate. I think he could sense the desperation in my voice thinking we were going to be stuck outside the gate in the cold all night!
We thanked Phillip graciously and apologized profusely for disturbing his evening. He even stayed with us for a bit trying to locate the manager who was nowhere to be found. Thankfully, a nice Italian couple on their way out to dinner called the manager for us. It turned out he had left to go to the store. It was freezing outside, and after a hard travel day, we felt slightly defeated having to get through this little hiccup at the end of our day. They were so kind to let us wait for the manager in their warm room, while we tried to communicate to each other through Google Translate. Good thing they had free, open WiFi to connect to!
This leads me to another lesson learned: get an international phone plan, even just for emergencies. We could have called the phone number to the manager ourselves, had our phones worked. Although, our Italian communication skills weren’t quite up to what they should have been when visiting this region. Cheers to the kindness of strangers in Italy!
Entry Gate
Upon check in, you are given a remote to control entry and exit to the gate.
Our initial remote did not work very well, if at all. In fact, on our first night, we thought we were going to be trapped inside the gate without any way to get any food! There is a manual way to open the gate by using a key, but you have to get your arm in a precarious position. Thank goodness my husband remained calm and patient. I certainly was not (hangry people problems)!
We were eventually able to request a new gate remote two days later, when we were finally able to catch someone at the castle who could provide us with one. It still didn’t work that great.
One of the things I would have liked to receive prior to checking in at the castle were instructions regarding what to do when you arrive at their closed gate, including which buttons to press on the intercom. We sort of figured it out, but it would’ve been nice to have been prepared ahead of time.
Castle Grounds
I’ll admit it’s pretty cool to say you stayed in a castle! I think everyone secretly dreams of staying in a castle, don’t you? The grounds were beautiful and extremely quiet and peaceful other than a hunting party going on one day on a nearby property. The views are also unreal! This is what I had always imagined when I thought of Italy. Visiting in the fall made the landscape extra colorful too.
Our Room
We stayed in the Torgiano room (all of the rooms are named after neighboring towns), which consisted of a sitting room with couch and TV, and a large bedroom and bathroom. If you picture rustic castle accommodations, this is definitely it!
The bathroom wasn’t anything to write home about, and we were missing bath towels the first day. However, it was sufficient enough for a few days. I also want to note that the towels were very rough, but I was reminded that many people in Italy hang their laundry to dry. So unless you are staying in a hotel, you might not get super soft towels! I think maybe we should try not to be so spoiled?
Daily Breakfast
One of the awesome things about staying at a B&B is having breakfast served to your room each morning. When we checked in to the castle, we were given a sheet of paper with breakfast items to choose from, and a spot to designate your desired breakfast time.
Note, it would be wise to study how to read or say breakfast items in Italian so that you can tell what you are selecting. Rustic accommodations in the countryside pretty much mean English isn’t going to be as widely-spoken as it is in the more populated areas.
For our breakfast service, we chose croissants, ham and cheese sandwiches, cappuccinos, fresh fruit, and juice. They do bring you the same items each morning. Unless you ask to change your selections, expect the same thing to eat daily. I’m not going to say the breakfast was spectacular, but it was nice to have a little sustenance before heading out for a day of exploring.
WiFi
WiFi is necessary sometimes when you need to figure out where you need to get to unless you have every detail pre-planned. The WiFi at the castle was pretty spotty – sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn’t. But it’s kind of to be expected, given the castle’s remote location. I’m glad we were able to use our offline map app “HERE” to at least help us to get going in the right direction. At least the WiFi at the castle is free!
Parking
There is a nice-sized designated parking area available for guests. As I mentioned before, you will need a car to get here!
Overall Recommendations
Castello Valenzino is suitable for people who enjoy rustic and remote accommodations. If you do decide to book here, be sure to get a room that has a kitchen and to stock up on a few essentials so you can cook up some food without having to worry about driving far to find a restaurant for dinner!
I would not recommend this accommodation for people who enjoy being in close walking distance to city sights and restaurants. Though it was a cool castle, we found that it wasn’t quite our cup of tea. I hope that Castello Valenzino works on improving their communication regarding arrivals for guests so they can have a smooth check-in process!
Castello Valenzino
Strada Provinciale di Colle del Pantano, 06019 Umbertide PG, Italy
Phone: +39 06 4550 8302
http://www.castellovalenzino.com/
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