Bolsena is an ancient hill top medieval town that dates back hundreds of years.  According to Wikipedia, records for Bolsena Lake – which is a huge crater filled with water – date back to 105 AD.

From our Umbrian palace near Castel Giorgio, we decided to drive to the near by medieval town of Bolsena.  Bolsena is actually in the province of Lazio of which Rome is the capital, close to the Umbrian border.

Bolsena is oh-so pretty. The lake is massive and almost looks like the sea. The Lake’s edge is dotted with pretty colourful hydrangeas, manicured gardens, and shady trees.

The short drive to reach Bolsena was enough time for Sam and Indi to fall asleep in the car.  As you can imagine, they were pretty cranky at being woken up.  Not even the bribe of a gelato could quietened them.  Indi was particularly grumpy and I have to secretly admit, I found it quite funny! The horesy ride thing that was available for kids to ride still couldn’t put a smile on Indi’s face.

The actual town of Bolsena is so so so cute!  Stone houses made out of black volcanic handmade bricks, narrow cobbled streets, flower boxes with gorgeous coloured flowers spilling over the sides, big wooden doors and cute small doors that look like they were designed for dwarfs, and a castle with a commanding tower that dates back to the 13th Century.

We did a little walk through the town and little 3 year old Sam was very excited to be seeing a castle where the brave knights once were.  Similarly, 5 year old Indi (once over her grump of having to walk up stupid stairs) was excited to see where the princess used to live.   We paid the two euros per person to be able to climb up the castle tower where the view of the Bolsena lake was stunning.

As you may imagine, at 4pm in the middle of an Italian summer, it was baking hot and we were keen to get back to our Umbrian palace and cool off in the beautiful pool.

Bolsena is well worth a look. It’s teeny tiny and absolutely cute.

Back at the Umbrian palace, our dinner was sensational.  We marinated some chicken in rosemary, garlic and lemon and cooked them over the coal BBQ.  Accompanied with barbecued eggplant and zucchini, it was healthy and heavenly.  The buffalo mozzarella we had bought was amazing and sitting in the beautiful garden of our villa, Lagoscello, it was a lovely evening.

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FACT FILE

Bolsena is in the province of Lazio and is 21km from Orvieto.