Biking through Barley to Bevagna

A biking day. The only rental options in this hilltown are e-bikes. Fortunately, our host kindly lent Camille her mountain bike, so we could have a family cycling excursion. Our apartment is at the topmost neighborhood of Spello, so the easiest part was descending out of town to the valley below. The hardest part was the climb back up at the end of our ride. We cycled across the valley mostly on lightly trafficked roads winding along farms and vineyards to yet another historical flashback medieval town. Before reaching Bevagna, there was a busy two lane road with large trucks. There was no shoulder and it got too scary to share the road with big trucks, so we detoured onto a paralleling foot path through a field of tall barley. I wore my mask to minimize the hayfever sneezing fit that followed. We were ready for our cappucini (and a pee)…unfortunately there was no water in the historical center because the plumbers were working on the pipes. We made due with spremuta d’arancia aka fresh-squeezed OJ and a visit to the dicey public loo (that has it’s own story…not to be divulged here). There is a big deal week-long medieval festival happening in late June, which we will sadly miss. However, we got to watch a group of high-school kids practicing their fan-fare perfomance to medieval music blaring on their teacher’s ‘boom-box’. It would be a bit more spectacular to watch the kids dressed in historical gowns and breeches instead of T-shirts and jeans.