Season 5, Episode 5 | What Are Italy’s Five Macro Regions?
Episode summary
In this episode of the Bella Italy Podcast, hosts Brian and Anthony discuss the philosophy of travel, emphasizing the importance of quality over quantity in travel experiences. They explore Italy’s macro regions, highlighting the diversity of culture, cuisine, and experiences across the country. The conversation covers the challenges of tourism fatigue in popular cities and advocates for a more authentic travel experience by venturing off the beaten path. The hosts also provide insights into planning itineraries that allow travelers to immerse themselves in the rich history and culture of Italy.
Takeaways
Traveling to Italy is about quality experiences, not just quantity.
Understanding Italy’s macro regions enhances travel planning.
Tourism fatigue affects popular cities, making authentic experiences rare.
Travelers should aim to explore the 99% of Italy that is less touristy.
Each region in Italy has its unique culture and cuisine.
Planning a trip from a macro level allows for diverse experiences.
Travelers should consider their interests when choosing regions to visit.
The hosts emphasize the importance of slowing down during travel.
Authentic Italian experiences can be found off the beaten path.
Italy’s history significantly influences its current cultural landscape.
Episode Transcript
0:00
Prioritizing Quality Over Quantity in Your Italian Travels
Hey guys, welcome back.
You’re listening to the Bella Italy podcast
and we are back around again.
0:16
Ladies and gentlemen, the Bella Italy podcast is coming at you, Anthony and Brian.
Brian and Anthony back live in the studio.
We are Live Today.
How you?
How you doing?
How you feeling?
0:28
Speaker 2
Feeling good, feeling energized, ready to do this.
And I guess you’re going to throw a curveball at me this morning.
So I’m a little nervous.
So I don’t know why, I don’t know why you tell me before the call that, hey, I’m going to throw a.
0:43
Speaker 3
Curveball at you.
I like the tension.
I can’t just spring it on you, you know, cold.
I’d like to.
It’s not a.
0:50
Speaker 2
Calculus.
It’s not like algebra questions or anything like that, is it?
1:07
Speaker 3
doing
something a little bit different.
1:09
Speaker 1
Today, as you know, first of all.
1:13
Speaker 3
Thank you for joining us if this is your your first.
1:16
Speaker 1
Time We Are the Bella Italy podcast, a natural outworking of the Italy with Bella travel group.
You can find us online it’ll with bella.com.
Go there and sign up for a free consultation if you like there’ll be Anthony, his lovely wife Denise.
1:34
We’ll walk you through a trip to to Italy.
So if you’re thinking about going to Italy, do yourself a favor go to Italy with Bella.
That said, we are the Bella Italy podcast and of course, I mean, this is what what fuels all of our passion and inspiration for what we talked about on the podcast.
1:52
Here it comes out of sending people successfully for years now to Italy for a dream vacation, a lifetime dream of a lifetime.
So here’s where we are in season 5.
We have had a couple of episodes already talking about.
2:11
We started with why not to go to, How not to go to late, 10 Reasons.
2:16
Speaker 2
Not we’re a travel company, but we’re always telling people why not to go.
2:20
Speaker 3
So far.
2:21
Speaker 2
We don’t care about the.
2:21
Speaker 3
Business for all you naysayers that say so you’re just on there to talk about your business, No, it’s the business that gives us something to talk about and we tell you not to go so.
2:33
Speaker 1
There, there you go.
2:34
Speaker 2
So please call us even though we don’t want you to go.
2:37
Speaker 3
No.
2:39
Speaker 1
No, but we, we, we want people to, to enjoy.
I mean, that’s that’s what gets us up in the morning.
2:46
Speaker 3
And you know, and helps us face ourselves in the mirror and say, OK, today’s going to be a great day because we’re.
2:54
Speaker 1
Because we enjoy.
2:55
Speaker 3
People enjoy.
You is beautiful.
You is handsome.
You is smart.
3:04
Speaker 2
Get on that phone.
3:06
Speaker 3
All right.
Well, we digress really quickly as you as you can see rails we digress, but we have spent a couple of episodes as Anthony.
3:15
Speaker 1
He said last time watching water boil, which is his favorite thing to do.
It’s but it’s the anticipation for putting the pasta in that’s exciting.
And, and, and what we talked about just really quick on the the last couple of episodes was laying a baseline for creating more savorable itineraries, slowing down to enjoy more.
3:39
It’s quality over quantity.
It’s getting rid of that bucket list or at least cutting it and a half and and adding space for spontaneity.
We talked about how to set up a, a really great 10 day, 12 day itinerary.
3:55
So go back, listen to some of those episodes.
I think you’ll get a lot out of it that will set you up for success on your next trip over.
Anything come to mind that you really liked out of the last three 4 episodes and you’d say hey, this is worth underlining or you know, running a highlighter over?
4:16
Escaping the 1% Tourist Trap for Authentic Italy
No, I think, I think The thing is what we, we do and I and I do enjoy that we’re true.
And I tell customers on the calls are in Zoom meetings and stuff that you know, one thing you will get out of it is our heart and the truth.
But I think the thing we pointed out is even if you go to Italy 10 times, you’re really only seeing 1%.
4:35
So we’re trying to make it as fruitful as you can when you’re only seeing the one.
Let’s say you’re crazy and you do 2%, you know, making is fruitful.
And I thought I thought it illuminated, you know, even if you’ve been several times, you need to keep going because you’re only seeing a really, really small nuance of Italy itself.
4:53
And there’s so much more to see.
So and and and and Brian even mentioned, you know, why not to go and it actually is valid reasons.
So I really enjoyed that of all the episodes in the season, you know, why not to, you know, take basically we’re trying to tell you is clean up the reasons you think you should go and go for the right reasons.
5:13
And I think that’s, you know, that that’s the power of this message.
OK, Yeah.
5:17
Speaker 1
Yeah.
And I’d, I’d, I’d like to say so that you can get the most out of it.
And, you know, but that that kind of turns on its head because that was part of the dialogue in the last couple of episodes was about how we’re a consumer culture and we come over here to Italy to consume.
5:32
But then, you know, there are cities that are experiencing tourism fatigue.
They’re just worn down.
It’s hard to find locals.
They’re all moving out to the hills.
And, you know, these other whatever odd shops are, are cropping up that aren’t traditional because they’re catering to that tourist mentality.
5:52
And then, and so we’re, we’re trying to be advocates for being travellers and not tourist.
The, the 1%, you know, statistic figure that I, I had mentioned is it, it’s a little tongue in cheek.
It’s from the Italian Ministry of Tourism and it it’s a it’s a real statistic.
6:10
They’re saying that 70% of foreign visitors focus on major cities and and it equates to roughly 1%.
So a large group, large population of tourists, large demographic coming coming over really do focus on only that 1%.
6:28
You and I don’t Italy with Bella customers don’t.
We’re looking to get off of the beaten path.
A lot of times we’re we’re trading out.
We’re pivoting from some of the more well known to the lesser well known because you get a more real experience.
6:45
And so, yeah, that that’s what we’re after.
That’s that’s the heart of why we do what we do.
6:51
Speaker 2
And it’s a learning, and it’s a learning thing too.
I mean, we just went to Luca and Luca was always like, I heard of it, most customers like I’ve heard of it, my friend.
But I went there and I was shocked how busy and how much English speaking tourism was.
And that was, you know, when I was there during COVID.
7:07
Obviously not a lot of English speaking, but you know what I’m trying to say.
7:10
Speaker 3
It was muffled.
7:11
Speaker 2
Through the mask, the mask.
But no, I mean, it’s now you’ve seen Naples.
You mentioned it in the podcast.
You know, some of those cities that weren’t tourist cities are now overwhelmed and it’s shocking.
You know, it’s just like, you know, whether it’s, whether it’s the Instagram of the world, the TikTok, but you know, that’s why we have to pivot and, and make sure of what we’re talking about.
7:32
And, and I love this macro, you know, regions that we’re going to do on this call.
7:36
Speaker 1
Yeah.
7:37
Discovering Italy’s Five Distinct Macro Regions
And so let’s let’s segue right there.
That’s, that is what we’re going to get into now as, as we, we teased about it a week or two ago on the last episode, saying that, you know, just like in the US, we have, we have macro regions.
7:53
We, we had, you know, the great Southwest, the Midwest.
You know, I, I grew up in the South and Midwest and you automatically know what states that you know, are comprised there out of the 50, you know, you, you kind of can work it out.
You know, Anthony’s from the Northeast.
8:08
You can tell by his by his accent, he’s going.
8:13
Speaker 3
To get a call.
8:13
Speaker 2
Parked the car, I got to get a coffee.
He’s.
8:16
Speaker 3
Just a little coffee talk I’m.
8:18
Speaker 1
Going to sit on the toilet.
8:20
Speaker 3
But you know, it’s it’s the same thing.
8:22
Speaker 1
Thing here in Italy, but, but you know, magnified because all of Italy can basically fit in the, the state of California.
And so you can imagine our, our separation of macro regions and, and even, you know, down to regions and, and provinces and then towns.
8:40
You know, my, my Sicilian wife can tell the accent of somebody who’s 3 kilometers away, but not from our town.
She can tell the accent.
It would be a little harder in the in the States to do that because we’re so much more spread out.
8:55
So it’s it’s concentrate, that’s what we’re.
8:58
Speaker 3
Even for me.
8:59
Speaker 2
Even for me from United States, they generalize, right?
Give you an example.
It’s a great example.
By the way, Brian, I’m down here in the South of Nashville, and I say you’re from are you from New York?
No.
And I’m like, well, no, I’m from Rhode Island.
Oh, I’ve been to Long Island.
No, it’s Rhode Island.
9:15
OK.
Oh, I’ve never been there.
But but that’s generalized, right.
So from an Italian perspective, you could tell if someone was from Tuscany or Venezia.
But now if I’m in Rhode Island, I go to Massachusetts.
That person from Massachusetts could tell them from the Northeast, but they can tell that I’m from Rhode Island when they say, Oh yeah, I could now, you know, So even in that little macro slash micro climate, because Rhode Island is basically micro.
9:42
So, you know, I think, I think they could tell Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, Connecticut, there is that, oh, they’re not from here, but I could tell they’re definitely from New England, you know, so.
9:51
Speaker 1
And I imagine.
9:52
Speaker 4
You can, you can tell somebody from Manhattan and you know, they’re not from your neck of the woods.
You, you know that.
I mean, you know, that’s more about the.
10:00
Speaker 2
Attitude than anything, not the language.
10:04
Speaker 3
Which is another subject altogether exactly, but it goes.
10:07
Speaker 1
Into the culture and and there’s.
10:09
Speaker 2
A reason for that.
Rome’s the same way, you know, Rome and New York, I don’t, I think that, you know, they have a certain vibe about the people, not just the language, you know.
So that’s good all.
10:17
Speaker 1
Right, Yeah, Yeah.
So as we come over to talk about Italy and the macro regions here, you know, it, it behooves us to say first, you know, we’re, we’re going to get into some of the regions.
Obviously as we’re dealing with a, a group of regions or a macro region, we’re, we’re talking at the base level.
10:38
Just for those that may not be familiar, Italy has 20 regions currently.
This has been sliced and diced.
And as we get into some of these, you’ll see how they’ve been merged together and piecemealed.
10:53
And really it’s provinces that have more, you know, a pull or, or influence on the towns and, and, and so that we’re, we’re going to get it.
All that fun stuff, really excited to dig in.
But you know, for those that don’t know, there’s 20 regions, five of those 20 are semi autonomous or autonomous regions.
11:18
And we’ll we’ll talk a little bit in a few minutes about that.
What, what I want to just kind of say here at the the very beginning is we’re talking about groups of these 20 regions.
And so the the first couple are in the North and as you might imagine, just like in the unit in the United States, we’ve got the Northwest and the Northeast, OK.
11:41
And so Northwest, we’re talking about Piamonte, Ielstat, Lombardi, we’ll say it in the English and then Liguria.
11:51
Speaker 4
So, you know, these are some famous cities that you would recognize, Turin, Milan, Genoa, these are the the cities, you know, principal cities that you would come to mind in the the northwest and the northeast.
That’s the other side.
Probably a lot of listeners are.
12:07
Speaker 1
Are.
12:07
Speaker 4
Familiar with this this is you know, especially Venice you’re you’re looking at coming into Venice as a big hub.
A lot of our clients on the Italy with Bella side, they, they come in or they go out from Venice, just great flights.
It’s a great.
12:21
Speaker 1
Hub, it’s a great place to start and you know, if you have a lot of first time visitors, that’s, that’s a great place.
But it’s also a region.
It’s a reason that there is so much tourism fatigue in that area.
And Venice is swamped literally with tourist and with water depending on the time of season.
12:41
And, and it can be, yeah, it’s got its own problems and things to, to think about.
But so this is what we’re talking about.
We’re talking about these macro regions.
There’s the center, there’s the South, and then there’s the island.
12:51
Speaker 4
And so this is going to be really fun.
We’re going to hopefully try to get into dedicate 1 episode at a time to each of these five macro regions because there’s so much to cover.
13:07
I’m actually thinking, you know, in the future we may actually take an episode for each region and help us drill down even even further.
It’ll be another season, but I’m excited to get into this.
13:21
Testing Your Knowledge of Italy’s Diverse Macro Regions
I wanted to start first with a little trivia.
Here it is you.
13:28
Speaker 3
Say it was.
13:28
Speaker 2
Trivia.
I thought it was going to be like your.
13:30
Speaker 3
Expertise, I said.
It’s fun, no?
13:33
Speaker 2
No, it’s like, what is this guy?
No, he got it.
13:36
Speaker 3
Wrong.
Don’t worry, don’t worry.
I don’t trust those Italy with Bella guys there.
13:42
Speaker 2
Who was the original king?
Who was the original King of Marquet in 1422, you know?
13:50
Speaker 3
If I could play some black background music, you know?
No.
All right, let’s start.
We’ll start off easy.
Don’t worry.
We’ll start off easy.
It it’ll be obvious.
It’ll be obvious.
OK, so let’s start with here’s the category and this is going to, you know, basically name one of these macro regions.
14:11
Here’s the category wine wheels and high style.
OK, that’s the category.
Here we go.
14:17
Speaker 1
Here’s the Here’s the question.
Which famous Italian product was not?
14:24
Speaker 3
From or born in this northwest Italy.
OK, here’s your four choices.
All right, you ready?
Which?
Which product was not is not from.
It’s easy.
You’ll love it.
Everybody loves it.
Everybody says it’s the best.
14:40
Here you go.
Barolo wine, thinking NW Barolo wine, Fiat cars, Parmesan cheese and vermouth.
Those are your 4 categories.
Which one is not from the northwest?
14:54
Speaker 2
OK, so terrain for Fiat Barolo for Piomonte in the Milan gay region and then Parmesan Reggiano cheese obviously at Amelia Romagna, which is not the northwest.
And what was the last one?
15:10
Speaker 1
Vermouth.
15:11
Speaker 2
Removed out of Turin, too.
Right out of Turin.
So there you go.
Yeah.
15:15
Speaker 1
OK.
15:15
Speaker 3
He answered correctly and the crowd goes wild cheering.
15:19
Speaker 2
I’ll take it.
I’ll take it as a gift card please.
15:23
Speaker 3
Alex, I’ll take the Northeast for 200, please.
15:27
Speaker 2
Next.
15:28
Speaker 3
Here we go northeast.
We’re, we’re, we’re moving around, we’re in the next macro region of canals and.
15:34
Speaker 1
Peaks.
As in peaks?
Mountain peaks?
OK, all right, here’s a question.
Venice was once a powerful maritime Republic, but what mountain range dominates the northern skyline of this macro region?
15:50
Is it the Apennines, the Dolomites, the Pyrenees or the Alps?
15:57
Speaker 2
I would say the Dolomites, but the Dolomites is I look most people are going to think of the Dolomites for the obviously the the altar aldage in the Trentino area, but I still.
16:10
Speaker 1
Which is northeast, which is which is absolutely correct.
Yeah, it’s because that is two in a row east and two in a row.
16:18
Speaker 2
Call my mother.
16:21
Speaker 3
Your son is he’s.
He needs to phone call for a lifeline.
16:25
Speaker 1
I’m smart.
I’m smart, mom smart.
16:28
Speaker 3
I smart.
I told you I was smart.
Italy’s done in UNESCO listed mountains famous for skiing, hiking and their pink glow at sunset.
Yeah, all of that’s from the Dolomites.
Great.
Good job.
All right, so we’re moving down into the central now.
This is the valley area.
16:44
This is, you know, the plains.
Here we go and rolling hills.
And so here’s the Renaissance.
The category is Renaissance Roots.
16:54
Speaker 1
Which Italian region is home to both the city of Florence and the famous Chianti Winehills?
Which Italian region?
17:04
Speaker 2
That would be.
17:04
Speaker 3
Toscana.
17:05
Speaker 1
Tuscany, Umbrea.
17:07
Speaker 3
Or.
17:08
Speaker 1
Lamarque.
17:10
Speaker 2
All right, so it’s Tuscany O Toscana.
17:11
Speaker 3
It’s Tuscany is.
17:13
Speaker 2
So it’s funny about that.
Funny about that is multiple times when I’ll ask a client on a, you know, whether they fill out a form or conversations, they will say, oh, I want to go to the South because I’ve already been to the north and I’m like, all right, what’s the North?
17:28
Well, I went to Tuscany and I went to Marque.
I’m like, well, that’s not the North, you know, So I don’t know where they get that impression.
I don’t want to get the impression.
It kind of scratched my head is they think that that’s where Italy ends.
I don’t know why, but they always say it’s the North to them.
So I thought it was interesting.
17:45
Speaker 3
Yeah, I think.
17:45
Speaker 1
No, I think you’re absolutely right.
For people that aren’t familiar or haven’t been off of the beaten path, it ends at Venice.
There is no Trieste up above, there is no Udine up above that.
There is Frioli, Julia, all of that.
18:02
It doesn’t exist for them.
It’s just up in the hills.
There’s nothing to go and do and see and eat and, you know, all of that kind of thing because that’s where their knowledge, you know?
And, and so, yeah, it makes sense that they would think that is, you know, Tuscany is the north, but yeah, it’s really central.
18:23
We’re talking about the central heartland, the green heart, as Umbria has been called, of Italy.
And so all right, let’s move on.
Here’s the next one.
We’re in the southern, the southern area, southern Italy.
It’s called the Kingdom.
18:39
Below is this category.
The ancient city of Pompeii, buried by Mount Vesuvius, lies near which major southern Italian city is it Bari, Naples, Palermo, or Leche?
18:57
Speaker 2
I appreciate the ease of this test.
I.
18:58
Speaker 3
Really do the cookies on the table where everybody could reach them.
19:04
Speaker 2
Exactly, don’t worry they get harder next season.
This is one O 1.
I say it’s Naples for the win.
19:13
Speaker 1
Naples is is correct.
It’s the chaotic and passionate heart of southern Italy, the birth place of pizza.
Yeah.
19:21
Speaker 2
I’d say I’m going to throw a curveball and put Sorrento in Naples and I have to get.
19:25
Speaker 3
My ruler out.
19:28
Speaker 1
So I I think the people from Sorrento think that they’re, yeah, they OK.
Anyway, yeah, we’ll move on.
Naples is the gateway, though, a lot of times to folks that want to do the Sorentine Peninsula that is Sorrento, the Amalficos, Capri, all of that.
19:44
Getting on to that peninsula is usually they’re flying in and out or they’re coming down from Naples.
Yeah, there you go.
All right, let’s, let’s wrap this up.
Here we have the category about the islands.
20:00
Two islands, 2 worlds.
We’re talking about two islands in particular, and this one has to do with Sicily.
Here’s the question, which of these is not located in Sicily?
All right, Mount Etna, Valley of the Temples, Costa Smeralda or Palermo.
20:22
Which is not located.
20:23
Speaker 2
In Alda, of course.
20:25
Speaker 4
Yeah, Costas Meralda.
That’s in Sardinia, famous for turquoise waters and luxury yachts.
Spectacular.
Yeah, there we go.
All right, well, good.
But.
20:38
Speaker 2
What about Alba?
You didn’t put Alba in there.
20:53
Speaker 1
Alba.
20:54
Speaker 2
Yeah, Alba, the island, you know, we should put that little island in there too, but obviously we can’t.
But it’s a good, it’s a good half a day trip.
21:02
Speaker 1
OK.
It’s a yeah.
And we’re talking about the macro regions.
And so these two islands make up the macro, the macro regions and and both, both of these major islands have smaller archipelago or smaller collections groups of islands around them.
21:19
And we will certainly get into that when we get to that episode.
21:24
Historical and Cultural Influences on Italy’s Regions
All right, So coming back around, you did good BB.
You know, as we’re, as we’re talking about this, I hope this is helpful to people to understand when they’re coming over to Italy.
21:41
Speaker 4
What they’re getting into, where they’re flying in and out of what region, what macro group it’s part of, because as we’re going to see, it has a heavy influence on the culture, the language, because of its history.
You know, in Italy has only been a country, right?
21:59
Like a unified country for so many years.
It was unified.
And we’re going to get to this and the first macro region that we’ll talk about next time, the Northwest, the House of Savoy.
We’ll get into all of that.
Piomonte Turin and how they unified Italy yet, but they were still monarchy.
22:19
And you know, we’re talking about after World War 2 and all the Nazis kicked out, fascism goes away, at least under the covers.
And we we have basically a, a Democratic Republic for the first time.
22:37
And so, you know, it’s still struggling to get its bearings and know who it is.
And I mean, it’s not even been around 100 years in its current form.
22:47
Speaker 1
And it’s had.
22:48
Speaker 4
So many political governments, like regimes, governments, an incredible number of successive, not successful, but successive governments and, and each one’s had their own pull and, you know, ideology and everything.
23:06
Instead of just two groups like we’ve got major groups in the States, there’s 5.
23:10
Speaker 2
Ten of them in Italy, yeah.
23:11
Speaker 4
You got each one trying to form a government and you know, it’s, it’s similar, more similar to the UK than the US in that sense.
But because of that, you notice the differences a lot when you’re coming here, or at least you should, you should be aware of all of that.
23:28
And So what what we want to say, I think on on this episode, talking about knowing what you’re going to get into, I want to give just an example about the Northeast.
OK, so we’re talking, you know, if you’re looking on a map, you go all the way to the north over to the right hand side.
23:45
You’ve got Venice and that whole area.
Venice was a superpower in its day.
It was this, you know, Republic, not like the House of Savoy, which was a duchessie, but the the Republic of Venice was had major influence all the way as far as even into the current Lombardy region.
24:09
But you’re talking about the, you know, Brescia and Bergamo it.
24:12
Speaker 1
Was far reaching far far.
24:14
Speaker 4
Reaching almost to the confines of Milan, which was its own Dutchie and so.
24:19
Speaker 1
He had this.
24:20
Speaker 4
These power players pulling back and forth and leaving their marks, you see, you know, what is it Saint Mark’s Lion as far away as, as Bergamo, because they left their mark there.
And, and so, you know, to the, to the, the tourist who’s just coming in and not traveling, well, they’re, they’re not going to see that.
24:41
They’re not going to know, Oh, this is actually more of a, a, a Venetian dish that I’m eating, or this is more of the dialect, or this is more of this, or this is more of that.
You’re not going to notice those things, but noticing that helps you to enjoy and get the most out of your trip.
24:58
And so just, you know, a.
25:00
Speaker 1
Simple.
A simple little example.
25:02
Speaker 4
Here, looking at the northeast, you’ve got Emilia Romagna, Friuli Venezia, Giulia Trentino, and, or you can call it S Tyrol and the Veneto, the, the, the area around Venice.
25:19
And, and as you look at, at these four regions that make up this macro region, they are, they’re, they’re clumped together, but they bring their differences, you know, and together and, and really, you know, Amelia Romagna is very different than Venice, very different, but it’s clumped together for a good reason.
25:42
And we’ll get to that.
25:43
Speaker 2
I got to say, if you look at the northeast of a macro level, it’s probably the most diverse because of Amelia Romagna getting up into the German influence, and then you got the Slovenia influence going into Trieste and Friulia.
So, you know, I think, you know, just putting that in my 2 cents, I think it’s the most diverse just looking at it from a, you know, 50,000 feet.
26:08
Speaker 1
It’s interesting, you know, we’re, we’re in a couple of weeks.
I’ll be back up in, in Bolzano reeling the far, far north, you know, towards the Austrian border of Italy.
And you can, you know, you, you notice that the language is marked markedly diverse and different than the rest of Italy.
26:29
And German, German is probably spoken as a first language.
Italian takes a back seat.
You’re going to notice that on websites, on menus, spoken on the street.
And you know, you go to Venice and it’s not a far cry.
26:44
You’re going to see German, German on a lot of menus because of its vicinity.
And you know, certainly more true in Trieste, which is a little north of Venice, but it’s, it’s, it helps you make sense on Piamonte, the other side of the northwest.
27:03
It’s, it’s the same kind of thing, but for in a very different way.
You’ve got French speaking, you know, our, our friend in the north, Stefano, he lives where he can actually hike from his Pia Monte town.
He can hike up to the border of France, cross the border, come back as a day hike.
27:22
And, and, you know, have gone to another country and, and you don’t think about that, but it, it leaves its mark.
It, it has an influence in the kind of traffic that you get.
And, and that’s why you were saying, you know, in a couple episodes back you were saying, oh, well, you know, we didn’t see many or we didn’t hear many English speakers.
27:39
We asked our our new partner that we had found and tested, you know, hey, how many American tourists do you get?
Well, not many, actually.
Most of our tourists are, you know, Swiss or German or Austrian or the French, you know, that kind of thing.
And this helps you make sense of why that is.
27:58
And so again, the more you understand, the better you can in joy.
And so, yeah, looking at.
28:05
Speaker 4
You know, like Emilio Romani, you’re mentioning how drastically diverse this macro region is.
You’ve got the high hills and Dolomites in the north.
You’ve got Venice and its lagoon and all of that influence from a former Republic.
And then you come down into the valley and the plains that the PO River Valley and the plains, I mean it, it is so drastically different.
28:29
And you know, the, the Romans had left their mark on a lot of these towns like Padova and Bologna and, and others in this area.
And they’re the reason there was this Emilian Rd.
Roman Rd. that connected these towns.
And so of course, they, they grew up together.
28:46
They cut their teeth together as Roman, you know, cities and and they have they share a lot.
They’re very different than the Venice.
And so all of that comes to bear, the history comes to bear on what we experienced today.
29:02
And and you know, we talked about that at the very beginning of of this season, talking about the history of travel and why we travel, what, what are the reasons, the right reasons to do that?
And understanding some of this history, I think helps us be better travelers.
29:19
Crafting Unique Italian Trips Through Macro Region Focus
Anything to say anything other than that before we we start sinking our teeth into some itineraries?
Anything come to?
29:28
Speaker 2
Mind, I like to go, I like to what you’re saying is, is I think a lot of people when they book a trip, they’re not looking at these facts.
You know, they’re not looking at different languages, they’re not looking at different food.
You know, we talk about that all the time is, and you’re looking at culture, you’re looking at history.
You know, there’s tons of renaissance in Venice.
29:45
Most people don’t know that, right?
There’s is, they don’t realize, you know, what they’re going to immerse themselves in and what’s right outside their door.
So, yeah, I think it’s very, very helpful to realize in a, you know, somebody looking at this, I would call it a macro trip, right?
30:02
You got a perfect trip.
They’re going to, you know, you can go to three or four regions in 12 days, you know, where you can see that northeast and take it all in, you know, and take in all the different culture of the mountains.
We do that a lot, right?
Venice to Bolzano, down to Lake Garda, maybe a coma de Bologna.
30:19
But you got to, you know, you, you have an opportunity not to look at it from not just a historical or art, but also wow, I’m going to have culture, cultural differences in this one trip.
And it’s so close in the northeast, you know, so that’s, it’s fascinating to me when you, you know, I, I, I know it, but you, when you illuminate it a little bit to me.
30:40
Oh, because I’ve done it so many times, but you illuminate it to me, it’s like, oh, that’s even more fascinating that, you know, when I move over to another region, it’s totally different, you know, So it’s, it’s a, it’s a fun way to actually plan a trip.
The more I look at it from a macro level, you can plan a trip from Northeast, Northwest Center.
30:58
Obviously the islands are a little different, but yeah, definitely it’s a, it’s a good way to look at it.
31:04
Speaker 1
Yeah, you know, I as I, as I’ve been thinking about this over the last couple of weeks and and, you know, planning and just reading and thinking about my own experiences and, and us as a, as a company, what we do on the Italy with Bella side it, it, it does kind of make sense.
31:19
I know a a lot of what draws people and, and we’ve said it so many times, one of the fascinating things and and the most beautiful things about Italy is its diversity.
But we’re talking about these macro regions as a cluster of.
31:34
Speaker 4
Three or four different regions and there is still so much diversity and food.
The food in Venice is drastically different than the food and Padova, but it’s a 45 minute ride it, but it’s drastically different.
And you know, Padova gets a lot of its influence from from the Bologna side.
31:53
And but you’re going to, you’re going to see that, you’re going to feel that.
And, and so we’ve been advocates of, you know, coming in and slowing down your trip, taking that bucket list, cutting it in half, maybe in half again, and deciding, OK, if I were to stay and, and not that this is a rule in concrete, but if I were to stay in a macro region and I slowed down a little bit and I looked at the diversity in this group, this cluster of regions.
32:24
And I had, you know, let’s say two or three different cities.
And, and this is what we’re going to get into when we talk about a macro region coming up on the the next couple of episodes, we’re going to get into what are the principal cities in this cluster in this macro region?
Where could you base out of what could you go and do and see?
32:42
Because you know, OK, if it’s your first time in that group of regions, then you’re going to want to hit some of the principal cities.
Sure, I get that.
But we’re also going to be advocates of taking the less famous, you know, and getting the off of the beaten path and seeing the more real authentic Italy that’s waiting and, you know, out of that 1%, you know.
33:03
And so that’s, you know, it’s slowing it down.
Is is step #1 though?
33:08
Speaker 2
You’re slowing down and you can name the cities and you just said it.
Padua.
I would say an Italian poverty.
What’s the poor?
The poor, poor of food poor.
You know it’s not the same food level right down the road as Verona in the same region.
Verona is why the food is a little elevated because of the.
33:24
Speaker 1
Wine is really related to the agriculture, the land, the farmer.
Verona has such a successful history and it’s much more rich for different reasons and and so of course, yeah, you you feel that though I mean, some of our.
33:42
Speaker 3
Favorite restaurants in Italy are are in Verona.
At least for me.
I’d say some of my favorite that I I just love to go to every time I’m there.
33:51
Speaker 2
So I think, I think, you know, we’re going to pull that out, but then you, you’re going to say, well, all right, I, I love the idea of pot or, but that’s not me.
But I do love wine and great food, but I want to be on the water and that’s when you go to Garda, I want to be in the mountains.
So it’s, it’s so much outside of just the cultural, it’s also what you like to do.
34:09
What do you want to pull out of it, Right.
So we can, it’s amazing when you look at just this macro from a wine pour, you know, the, the Padua with the Giotto’s Chapel and the art and the, the, you know, just it’s, it’s, it’s, you know, always blown away by Italy.
34:24
But the more you dig in and unwrap it, the more you unwrap it, you realize, you know, I, we’re going to pull out these 10 cities, but you might like 6 of them because that’s how you like to do travel and that’s what you want to get out of it.
So, you know, so that’s how you build a trip by pulling those cities out and then figuring out what you want to do and why it speaks to you.
34:43
That’s good.
34:43
Speaker 1
And then you see this kind of thing through the eyes of an Italian and it’s really illuminating.
I took my wife the last time I was in Padava and we we spent two days there.
And as we’re walking around, what catches her eyes as a Sicilian, what catches her eye?
34:59
Bretzel.
35:01
Speaker 3
So this is bread pretzel shop because it’s German, it’s foreign.
It’s so foreign to her.
And she’s like, oh, please, you know, it’s not the fancy restaurant that she wants to sit down.
It’s not the wine tasting.
35:16
It’s not the this or the other.
We took this boat, you know, from Padova to Venice and it’s got all these mansions on where all the famous people we actually saw, you know, Napoleon’s toilet, which was the highlight of the trip.
But all that to say, what really caught her eye was a pretzel, you know, and.
35:37
Speaker 1
Because you just don’t find that down here in the South.
But again, that’s some of the differences that especially through the eyes of an Italian who’s not from that.
35:46
Speaker 2
Area.
She was Truffles too, right?
Yeah, Truffles also.
Right?
She’s from Sicily.
She’s haven’t seen Truffles.
You, you had her.
Introduce them to her.
We do.
35:54
Speaker 1
Have yeah, they do exist here in the Nebrodi Mountains.
They do have some wild truffles.
They’re nothing, you know, to the, the pungency level of even what you guys have in Umbria or what you can find where we were in La Marque, Brutzo, all of that very, very different.
36:14
But yeah, they, they exist, but it’s not part of the culture.
It’s not part of the cuisine.
We had to go to a couple years ago, we went to Anna in the very center of Sicily and there was a, a restaurant there that actually had truffles because it’s from the hilltowns, you know, and from the, from these hilltowns, they, they have these on on the menu with just a fried egg.
36:35
Fabulous.
That was her first experience, the first time she ever tasted truffle.
I that’s just amazing to me because in the North.
36:43
Speaker 3
It’s like on every menu if you’re in PIA Malta.
36:46
Speaker 1
You can’t escape it, you know.
But again, you know.
Knowing that might help you choose your trip because if you don’t like that or if it’s not part of your palate or you don’t care about the wines or this or that, then you’re going to choose something, you know, And it’s not just, well, I’ve got to take my selfie and Positano, OK, but you’re going to this rich area, you’ve got Pompeii or paste them, or you’ve got these archaeological sites, you’ve got Mount Vesuvius, you got, you know, Sorrento, you’ve got the islands, you’ve, you’ve got so many
37:20
things to go and do and see and enjoy.
37:23
Speaker 4
But not knowing that it exists, all you can talk about is what you saw on, you know, TikTok or Instagram.
Yeah.
So we want to get out of that rut.
We want to expand our knowledge a little bit.
We want to understand.
We want to educate a little bit, you know, not to be boring, but to enjoy more when we come over so we know what we’re getting into and.
37:47
Exploring the Untouched 99% of Italy’s Beauty
We can choose.
37:48
Speaker 4
More wisely, I think.
37:49
Speaker 2
And that’s an educational thing we do, too.
So if we’re talking about cities, well, what can I do in that city?
And then I’ll say to be funny.
Well, you can do a truffle hunt.
We have some great truffle hunters.
You mean those chocolate things?
Why would they be in the woods?
38:03
Speaker 3
Well, truffle, yeah, OK, there’s a amazing though, huh?
So.
38:08
Speaker 2
So truffle, go get chocolate truffles on the retreat, that’d be awesome.
38:13
Speaker 3
They’ve got these special pigs.
Exactly.
They’re connoisseurs.
38:18
Speaker 1
They.
38:19
Speaker 3
Pooped chocolate, but you’re not going.
38:25
Speaker 1
Yeah, exactly.
But that’s an.
38:26
Speaker 2
Important.
38:27
Speaker 3
Distinction.
That’s an important distinction.
So anyway.
Well.
38:32
Speaker 1
I think we’ve we’ve talked about it enough.
I’m I’m excited to dig in.
We’re going to go we’re going to dedicate an episode per macro region.
So coming up, we’re going to start in the extreme northwest.
All right, So if you want, you know, if you’re listening to this podcast and you haven’t gone on to the next episode yet or it hasn’t come out great, This is your, this is your chance to do, you know, brush up a little bit on your geography.
39:00
Take a look at the upper northwest, so upper left hand side towards the French border and, and just take a look, see if you recognize something there.
There, there are some famous mountains.
I’ll go ahead and tell you this spoiler.
There’s some famous mountains that we’re going to dig into.
39:16
The Matterhorn is 1.
That’s the very famous.
It has a, it looks like a, a pyramid.
It has that, that peak.
That’s just one like a, like a dagger.
It’s it’s, yeah.
In Italian, in Trevino, which is like a little deer, you know, like, so the stag.
39:35
Yeah.
And then you’ve also got a very famous brand named after a mountain there.
39:40
Speaker 4
Mont Blanc.
Mont Blanc.
39:42
Speaker 1
And both of these are on borders either between France or Switzerland and.
39:49
Speaker 4
They they form part of this Ayosta Valley that we’re going to talk about Piamonte.
I’m excited to get in.
I love this area.
It’s so rich.
This is where the first monarchs were the first king of Italy and he unified Italy, you know, for better, for worse it.
40:06
Speaker 3
Is it is.
40:07
Speaker 2
Little as it’s history now.
40:11
Speaker 1
So I’m excited to to get into all that.
So you can brush up a little bit before we we dig in.
I’ll I’ll leave you.
40:19
Speaker 4
Just with this, you know, with this thought again, the one, it’s the 1% problem, the over tourism of certain select cities in Italy has created the the fatigue of a lot of locals there that don’t even want to be part of it anymore.
40:41
They’re escaping.
And so this is the trend where you’re looking at the 99% of Italy that’s relatively untouched by the mass tourism engines that you know, they, they come in, we we’ve talked about this, they come in on these, you know, 60 passenger bus.
41:01
You follow somebody with a fluorescent umbrella and you’re listening to, you know, somebody go on and on, which is fine.
I don’t mind tours, but when it’s just this, you know, kind of, it’s not.
It’s not made to order.
It’s not tailored to your specific desires.
41:18
You’re going to get what you get no matter what.
That’s just not us.
And hopefully that’s not you who’s listening.
You want to get out of that 1% rut and into the 99% and I think that’s what we’re going to for the rest of this season in particular.
41:34
That’s what we’re going to try to help set you up for.
So you are successful at getting out to the 99.
All right, that’s it, man.
41:45
Speaker 2
Good job.
Excited.
Yeah.
Always exciting talk to you.
No, I’m thinking, I was just thinking we could talk about this.
I would love, I would love.
I think we’re putting this on YouTube right now.
So I wonder if we should put up.
I wonder if we put up maps and we show like the regions and the mountains, right, Not the mountains, but you know, you know, I think that might be a good idea.
42:04
We’ll talk about it.
But you know, I think for visual we can show the different areas on the map.
So yeah.
42:11
Speaker 1
In fact, yeah, if if you’re listening and you want to prep, you can, you can just, you can actually search macro region Italy and it’ll show you the five clumps groupings of these regions that we’re going to be talking about.
It is we’re not making this stuff up.
42:26
This is real and.
42:28
Speaker 3
Make it up regions.
42:29
Speaker 1
Political for political reasons and for tourism reasons.
This has been talked about for years here in Italy.
So I’m excited because we’ve never really dealt with the regions like this before.
But we’re going to take a deep dive.
And hopefully, if somebody is wanting to slow it down off of that beaten path and 99% and, and focus on this macro region and spend some time there, go deep.
42:54
I think they’re going to be blown away by the experience that they come back with because they’re not going to be as exhausted and fatigued from all the travel.
They’re slowing it down.
They’re going to stay longer.
They’re going to go to the less famous.
They’re going to get out of the lines that everybody else is waiting in and the big city centers.
43:14
And again, we’re not opposed to that.
If you’ve got to get that out of your blood, get it out of your blood so that you can get on to these other things that are, I think every bit as appealing but just unknown to us as American so.
43:28
Speaker 2
So I would look at it as you could possibly do 5 trips to Italy and have 5 macro.
I think it’s 5, right?
I’m gonna come right.
Five macro regions.
Yeah, yeah.
And do 5 trips, you know, and say, you know, I covered it, I understand it.
And it is a lot of money.
43:44
It is a lot of time.
But if you don’t, you know, if you want to look at it from, hey, I’m going to do 3 out of five and I’m going to feel that I saw Italy as much as I could.
I think it’s a great idea.
43:52
Speaker 1
It’s not, it’s not an unthinkable.
We, we actually have clients now and you know, we’re a young company.
We actually have clients now.
They’re on the 3rd, 4th trip.
It’s, it’s possible.
And that’s just in the last couple of years.
44:05
Speaker 2
Exactly.
44:06
Speaker 1
So excited to take this journey with you and all right, so if if you’re listening and the next episode is out.
44:13
Speaker 4
What are you waiting for?
Dive in and we will see you there.
44:17
Speaker 1
Ciao.
For now.
Ciao.
