ASSISI • THE WAY OF SAINT FRANCIS

✈️ Arrival at Perugia San Francesco d’Assisi (PEG) or Rome (FCO/CIA) and transfer to Assisi. If you fly to Perugia, it’s convenient to use Umbria Airlink (bus+train) or a taxi; from Rome—regional Trenitalia trains with a change in Foligno, or the direct Sulga bus. Stay in the historic center: the stone city on the ledge of Monte Subasio immediately sets a “medieval perspective” for the whole trip.

🚶 Evening orientation walk: Piazza del Comune—the heart of Roman-medieval Assisi. The Temple of Minerva (now the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva) with its 1st-century BC Corinthian portico and the Captain’s Tower (Torre del Popolo) introduce the context of “ancient forum → medieval square.” Soft light emphasizes the pink Subasio limestone from which the entire city is built.

🚶 In the morning—Basilica of Saint Francis (Piazza San Francesco, 2). Start with the Lower Church: the crypt with the saint’s relics, chapels rich in color and gold, and the warm intimacy of the space. Then the Upper Church with Giotto’s grand cycle on Francis’s life: the narrative, the “architecture of light,” and the rhythm of pointed arches create a sense of “scenography of faith.” Don’t miss the Museo del Tesoro (collection of sacred art).

🚶 San Rufino Cathedral (Piazza San Rufino, 3)—a строгий Romanesque facade and interiors where Francis and Clare were baptized. Below is the Museo Diocesano e Cripta di San Rufino: ancient sarcophagi, fragments of early Christian decor, a treasure of reliquaries. Climb the bell tower (on schedule)—a panorama over Assisi’s “stone fan” of streets.

🚶 Go down into the Museo Civico: Foro Romano e Collezione Archeologica (Via Portica, 2). The underground layout of the forum with tabernae, a cistern, and epigraphy links today’s square with the ancient “square of power.” Back above, look again at the Temple of Minerva: a rare intact ancient facade within the urban fabric.

🚶 In the morning—San Damiano (Via San Damiano, 7): a stone courtyard, cells, and cloister where the “Canticle of the Sun” was born. This is an example of “poor” architecture, where scale, silence, and light are the main materials. After lunch—Basilica di Santa Chiara (Piazza S. Chiara, 1): Umbrian transparent Gothic; in the crypt are the saint’s relics, and in the chapel the famed San Damiano Crucifix.

🚶 Eremo delle Carceri (Via Eremo delle Carceri, 38)—a hermitage in an oak-beech forest on the slope of Monte Subasio: caves, tiny chapels, stone paths, and monastic buildings “tame” the terrain. Catch the midday silence and scenic openings over the valley. Optional—a short trek in Parco del Monte Subasio: in the pastel sunset light the city’s limestone becomes almost pink.

🚶 Go down into the valley to the Basilica di Santa Maria degli Angeli (Piazza Porziuncola, 1)—a gigantic counter-architecture sheltering the small Porziuncola. Inside is a museum with artifacts from early Franciscan history. The contrast of scale is the key to understanding “greatness that protects smallness.”

🚆 A short train ride (≈10–15 min) to Spello. On foot: Porta Venere with the dodecagonal Propertius Towers—a powerful Roman urban-planning “frame.” Then the Villa dei Mosaici di Spello—refined late-Roman polychrome floors (the “Sun,” “Vessels,” “Shields” rooms) and a modern museum shell carefully “floating” above the archaeology.

🚌 Travel by bus (usually via Perugia; allow 1.5–2.5 hours each way). Gubbio: the Roman Theatre in a green pocket at the foot of the hill—a fine illustration of an ancient stage (1st century BC). In the town itself—Chiesa di San Francesco (Piazza Quaranta Martiri): here the “taming of the wolf” became part of the city’s memory and iconography.

🚌/🚆 Assisi → (train to Arezzo) → Bibbiena (TFT train) → bus to Chiusi della Verna, then walk 2–3 km along the old Beccia road or a short taxi ride to the La Verna Sanctuary. Check in near the sanctuary. Evening: fogs in the forests of the Casentino Park and the mass of the monastery cliff—a powerful experience of “cliff architecture.”

🚶 Santuario della Verna (Via del Santuario, 45): processional corridors, the Chapel of the Stigmata, pass-through courtyards and wooden interiors—everything is subordinated to the memory of September 17, 1224. Step out into the forest—trails of the Foreste Casentinesi national park: dark needles, mosses, the whisper of wind, a sense of the continuity of prayer and nature.

🚌/🚆 Morning transfer to Rieti (usually La Verna → bus to Bibbiena → train to Arezzo → regional trains via Terni/Foligno → Rieti; allow 4.5–6 hours total, or book a transfer). Timewise—1–2 sanctuaries: Greccio (mountain hermitage and the “first Nativity” of 1223) and Fonte Colombo (the order’s rule and healing). If there’s daylight left—La Foresta in the chestnut groves. Evening departure to Rome/Perugia or an extra night in Rieti.