Umbria is often referred to as the green heart of Italy.

The view across the Umbrian valley from Assisi with its patchwork of fields confirmed this. Umbria has a reputation for its food, wine and olive oil; all of which we can confirm from our stay in Assisi.

Our days in Assisi, a medieval town that looks across the valley, had enabled us to sample the wines. Montefalco Sagrantino and Montefalco Rosso were becoming favourites.

We visited a local wine bar, Bibenda, that had a reputation not just for the wines but also for its sommelier owner who has a truly extensive knowledge about the region.

We’d seen in a “things to do” post from Airbnb about a “new experience”, being a wine tour of a Montefalco winery and decided to see if we could make it work without a car.

Who wants to drive if you are doing some wine tasting?

After a bit of to and fro, the host of the tour arranged to pick us up at the nearest train station and drop us back after our visit.

We arrived at Trevi station a little early. Like Assisi Trevi station is some distance from the town and the station is just a building. There we waited for a short while before our host arrived.

Our host , was a former local mayor and proud member of a third generation family wine business, called Bocale Vinci. As someone conducting my PhD research on family wine businesses – what could be better?

A short drive from Trevi and we were at the winery. A small by Australian standards winery on 9 hectares (from memory). Our host, Valentino, told us the story of the winery from his grandfather’s founding of the business, how the property had been bigger but through succession strategies that had involved carving the property up, his family’s property was now much smaller than when his grandfather had established the business.

He talked us through the replanting of the vineyard and showed us old trellising techniques. Our host told us how the business had moved from a producer for the local region, to today where nearly 70% of the production is exported. Whether it was my interest as a PhD student or just my interest in the wine industry, it was all fascinating.

The winery adopts a number of sustainable practices, solar power, and natural cooling and is an organic winery. The smell of the wines in the small winery, the stainless steel and oak barrels were all part of the charm.

After hearing the winery’s history and then having the winemaking technique explained, it was time to taste the product. The tasting room, displayed the family’s wines. Our tasting was accompanied with bruschetta sprinkled with salt and their own olive oil and finished with a very potent splash of grappa. Va Bene!

With our tour of the winery over it was time to be delivered to the station for our return journey. Our host ever keen to show off the region took us for a short tour of Montefalco and dropped us at Foligno.

Travel Tip

• Assisi railway station is a few kms from the town itself. A 15 Euro taxi ride or a bus trip on line C (2 Euro).
• Have 1 Euro coins with you to use the bathroom at the train station or anywhere