Abruzzo
in Italy

Two hours from Rome and feeling considerably further. Abruzzo is the Italy that the grand tour missed: Apennine peaks above 2900 metres, three national parks, Marsican brown bears moving through the beech forests of the Parco Nazionale, and an Adriatic coastline that has stayed largely free of the development that consumed the coasts further south. The hilltop villages here have the lived-in quality of places that never had to perform for visitors because the visitors mostly went elsewhere. The food is shepherds' food, honest and very good: arrosticini grilled over embers, pasta alla chitarra with lamb ragù, saffron from the Navelli plateau that supplies some of the finest in the world. Abruzzo is the region Italians know about and visitors are only beginning to find. The window for arriving before it gets complicated may not stay open much longer.