The Fugates are coming! Part 4 - Orvieto (St. Patrick's Well)

On the way down to Rome Sarah, her parents, and I stopped for the day in Orvieto, a small city in southern Umbria that sits atop the summit of some volcanic rock. Some of the cliffs drop straight down a long way and is emphasized in areas by defensive walls. In order to get into the city you have to take the train to Orvieto Scalo (the town at the bottom of the hill) and then take the funicular railway up to the top.


I always wanted to ride a funicular railway, ever since I saw To Catch a Thief and Cary Grant says, "I can't even spell funicular." That's all it took.
Anyway, a funicular railway (unlike a cog railway, or some such nonsense) is one in which two cars counterbalance each other on a cable that is attached to both cars.


They pas each other in the middle of the track on the way up the very steep incline. It wasn't really exciting, but now I can spell funicular. Or funicolare in Italian, of course.


One of the first things we did was go to a cafe. Then we went to this little unassuming building. This is the entrance to St. Patrick's Well.


Down we go.


There are two spiraling slopes that wind down to the bottom in a double helix.


And it keeps going and going...deep into the hill.


It does have a bottom though. And at that bottom there is water. It is a well, after all.
Here's the view down into the well with the flash.


And here's the shot without flash.


Here is the view back up from the bottom.


There's a little bridge over the water that goes from one path to the other, and they don't meet again until the top.


Sarah and Steve a few levels above me. It was a very tiring trip back to the top. Apparently they used to lead mules down to haul the water back up in jars. They took one path down, crossed the bridge, and took the other path back up so that there could be continuous, unobstructed trips.


Pope Clement VII built the well while he was taking refuge in Orvieto during Charles V's sack of Rome in 1527. He feared that they might run out of water in the event of a siege.


It's a neat but touristy little town.


It kind of reminds me of Assisi, only a slight bit smaller. They both have train stations in a little town at the bottom of a hill and separate methods of travel to get up to the city. And they're both in Umbria, about thirty mile from each other.


And they're both beautiful.


See! Proof positive.