Ascoli Piceno to Urbino.

The sun seems to rise here at about 5am. It can really mess with you when it gets light that early and make you think you’ve over slept. It is another beautiful day and breakfast on the terrace looking across the river at the walls and towers of the old city is very pleasant. Fresh homemade apple and raisin tarts, cappuccino, espresso, orange juice, ricotta cakes and yogurt.. I could get used to this kind of breakfast. (served to me on a terrace in Italy…)

Getting out of Ascoli Piceno is a lot easier than getting in to it and soon we are zipping along the A14 Autostrada along the coast of the Adriatic Sea, mountains on one side and the sea on the other. The scenery is absolutely lovely.

After we leave the Autostrada and about 400 roundabouts which always seem to exit to the left (?) we find our way up and in to the very small walled city of Urbino without much trouble. The Albergo Italia is a lovely, modernized place at the base of the back wall of the Ducal Palace and the cathedral.

At check in the girl gives us a parking pass so we can get some lunch before taking the car out of the walls to the parking area. This is common that you can drive into the city to check in to your hotel and drop your luggage but you have to park outside the walled city itself. The directions I am given take me right through the main piazza and down a very narrow, very steep road with people and cars and strollers and doors (whee!) through a stone gate and to the free parking area. I am ‘lucky’ enough to get the second to the last spot before the paid parking area starts. The spot is tight… the drivers door very much in the bushes and I have to climb over the stick and out the passenger side. (agh… tomorrow morning is going to be even more fun getting back in.)

The climb back up to the hotel will leave me feeling it in my legs for a while.

Urbino is a college town and the home town of the painter Raphael. It is positively crawling with young people. A couple of hours of wandering aimlessly and we have seen most of the place. I think it gives Cortona a run for the charming hill town prize but D. doesn’t think it can compete.

It does have a restaurant called Tratoria Del Leone though. Recommended by the front desk clerk at the hotel, we have no reason to doubt so down the hill and under the church we are seated near a window looking up at the crazy steep road. We don’t know it but we are about to have our socks knocked off.

We share an antipasti of breaded fried olives stuffed with broccoli and sausage. The sausage stuffed ones are unbelievable and the broccoli ones merely delicious. D. .has a frittata with pumpkin, cheese and mushrooms and a plate of spinach (again) with pecorino cheese.

I have the coniglio,,, rabbit stuffed with sausage, olives and pancetta seasoned with fennel top and a plate of leaks and spinach.    This is without question the best rabbit I have ever had. For desert D. has the chocolate tart with “wild berries” sauce. The tart like a flourless cake is excellent. I have a chilled almond mouse with an amaretto reduction on it. What a way to end a great meal and a lovely day.

Urbino will not be soon forgotten.