Marie-Louise Sciò’s guide to Tuscia

A handy rule of thumb about Italy: if the Etruscans or the Romans were there, it’s probably a good idea. I’ve been going to Tuscia, the northern part of Lazio, which was a real Etruscan stamping ground, since I was about eight years old. I used to visit my childhood friend at Villa Tirrena, the house of her parents. It has magnificent views over the town of Civita di Bagnoregio and the surrounding canyons, all eroded and honeycombed. Tuscia is below Tuscany and just west of Umbria, which have those softer landscapes people associate with central Italy. This isn’t like that. It’s very wild – there’s nothing pristine or perfect about it, which is probably why Tuscia has never taken off like those places have. And there’s a very powerful energy. It’s not for everyone; but it really stuck with me.

A handy rule of thumb about Italy: if the Etruscans or the Romans were there, it’s probably a good idea

Paolo Crepet and Cristiana Melis live in the old archbishop’s palace in Civita, and have a tiny hotel in town, Corte della Maestà. It has only four rooms, each of them totally unique like a house, designed with antiques and salvage. There’s a really cosy sitting room with a fireplace downstairs, and the long kitchen-breakfast room used to be an ancient road – it still has the old flagstones. 

Civita itself is tiny, tiny, on top of a hill in the middle of the canyons. The only way to get to it is via a footbridge. One of my favourite restaurants is La Cantina di Arianna, right in the old town. Cristiana took me there a couple of years ago, and I had what was possibly the best chicken I’ve eaten in my life. They have this enormous forno they stick everything into: chickens and vegetables wrapped in parchment. It’s all so good you almost cry. 

The other must here is Alma Civita, on a tiny side street. The space is simple but the food is lovely. The day-trippers can be like a huge tide sometimes, but at night Civita empties out and it’s the most romantic thing in the world to walk across the bridge to reach it. If you don’t feel like navigating the bridge, Il Bocconcino, in Bagnoregio, is divine. Gloria, the owner, is from Sardinia; she only does a few dishes but you can taste the love in every one of them.  

When we want to venture further we’ll drive to Bolsena, the pretty town on the lake of the same name. I’m not a lake person – they’re kind of depressing to me – but Bolsena is clear and inviting; you feel good there. Trattoria da Giggetto and Trattoria del Moro are the places to go. You can actually take a boat to Giggetto from town: it has its own jetty (and gets really busy in the summer, so book ahead). 

In Bolsena itself there’s the Palazzo del Drago, which belongs to the era of the Farnese palaces that were built across Tuscia in the 16th century. Many of these houses – Villa Caprarola, Villa Lante – have famous gardens as well. The Palazzo del Drago is less known but has extraordinary interiors and frescoes; you can also book a private tour. Right on the main street in Bolsena, La Medusa makes and sells pretty terracottas. And not far away from Bolsena is Orto Vulcanico La Lupa, created in 2016 by Jonathan Nossiter, the film director and sommelier – he did the wine programmes for Balthazar and Il Buco in New York. Here, he has this agricultural revival project, growing and producing products from ancestral seeds; you can visit the farms and do a little tasting of some of the things they make.

Lazio wines haven’t really got their due internationally. The d’Amicos are the ones who really put Tuscia on the wine map at Villa Tirrena, which has one of the most spectacular canteens. (You can also stay at the villa itself, which has seven bedrooms.) Sergio Mottura is another local producer who has a very simple cellar and cantina, in Civitella d’Agliano. You can book a visit and do a tasting, though it’s not at all fancy. But then, nothing is fancy here. That’s what is so appealing about Tuscia; how simple and almost selvaggio it is.