Is Le Marche the Next Tuscany?

NEW YORK TIMES
By CHRISTOPHER SOLOMON

Published: May 22, 2005

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This is what Tuscany must have felt like 10 or 20 years ago, before it was discovered by tour groups and their omnipresent buses - carrying thousands upon thousands of travelers who flock there each year to try to recreate the pleasures of "Under the Tuscan Sun." One Tuscany wine-growing area is so crowded with British expatriates and second-home owners that that country's press calls it Chiantishire. In short, Tuscany, for all its undeniable charms, is an increasingly challenging place to have an intimate encounter with true Italy.

Seasoned travelers have begun casting about elsewhere for that authentic experience. In the last two years, the British, those shock troops of Italian tourism, have been filling cheap Ryanair flights to a revived Puglia, Italy's sun-bleached stiletto heel. Some observers have anointed a cleaned-up, post-Mafia Sicily the Next Big Thing. But others are heading to the calf of Italy's boot, to Le Marche, a small, diverse province rising from the Adriatic Sea to the 6,000-foot peaks of the Apennines. In between lies a Tuscan-like rumple of lavender fields, sunflower fields and vineyards spread across hills that hump off toward every horizon like a patchwork quilt on an unmade bed. In 2003, according to the Italian National Institute of Statistics, Le Marche had just 7 percent as many visits by foreigners as Tuscany.

What do those fewer travelers find there?

"Italian-ness," says Michael Eldridge, a British photographer and painter who fled what he calls the increasingly theme park feel of Tuscany with his Italian wife nearly five years ago, and converted an old convent in the Sibylline Mountains in the Marches, as the name is rendered in English. He speaks fondly of the region's ancient towns that cap seemingly every hilltop here - towns full of twisty streets but often empty of tourist buses and English accents.

He also loves the people, saying ,"They're kind and they're gentle and they're modest and they're slow."

Slow?

"They're a bit slow in that they'll spend a half a day talking to you," he explains. "The people from northern Italy would probably say they're a bit medieval here."

After a weeklong visit last month I, too, have found in Le Marche the vera Italia that both the Briton and the Bolognese spoke of - a place where travelers can still feel a genuine sense of discovery and quiet pleasures as they meander back roads and walk on cobbles that haven't yet been polished by the soles of a million tourists.

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Our itinerary is purposefully loose, guided only by two pledges. The first: Stay away from Le Marche's 110 miles of coastline. Though the seaside towns of Pesaro in the north and San Benedetto del Tronto in the south are said to hold charm, much of the coast has been developed in recent decades and is unappealing, and crowded in midsummer to boot. Seekers of a Tuscany-like experience will find the region's charm rises in almost inverse proportion to the distance from salt water.

The second rule: Stay off the nation's freeways when possible and stick to the curvy side roads. Unknown Italy isn't found between toll booths.

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Visitor Information

Le Marche, or the Marches, has its feet in the Adriatic Sea and its head in the 6,000-foot peaks of central Italy's Apennines, on the border of Tuscany and Umbria. Between beach and border is a land that is almost 90 percent hills and mountains, much of it pleasant hill-and-dale agricultural land where church steeples crown every high point. Even in summer, temperatures can be cool in the higher places. But expect hot temperatures in midsummer near the crowded beaches.

GETTING THERE

Flying to Le Marche has grown somewhat easier in the last few years. Falconara airport in Ancona is now served by Alitalia (from Rome and Milan), (800) 223-5730, www.alitalia.com, and Ryanair (from London), www.ryanair.com/site/EN/, among others. Ryanair also flies from London and Germany to Saga airport in Pescara, about 85 miles south of Ancona in Abruzzo, the next province to the south, which can be used by those who want to explore the southern Marches.

Other small carriers also fly between Pescara and Rome, Milan and Paris. But the smaller airlines don't generally depart for Le Marche from the airport used for arrivals from the United States. For example, a round-trip ticket to London was recently $570 on British Airways, and a connection to Ancona was just $115 round trip on Ryanair. But the international flight arrives at Heathrow Airport, while the Ryanair flight leaves from Stansted Airport. A National Express bus, www.nationalexpress.co.uk, from Heathrow to Stansted costs $39 at $1.91 to the pound), or $49.50 round trip.

To explore Le Marche, a rental car and a very good road atlas are mandatory; cars can be rented in Ancona and Pescara. Rental cars aren't cheap in Europe; my compact diesel, from Europcar, www.europcar.com, cost $290 in April.

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WHAT TO DO

Much of the pleasure of the Marches is simply wandering its towns and stumbling upon its vineyard tasting rooms, but a few places are worth scheduling a visit to see. Here are just two:

The Ducal Palace of Urbino, (39-0722) 322-625, a classic Renaissance palace with works by Raphael among others, is open Monday 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Tuesday through Sunday until 7:15 p.m. Admission, $5.25.

In Tolentino, the Basilica of San Nicola, (39-0733) 976-311, www.sannicoladatolentino.it, with its bright floor-to-ceiling cycle of early 14th-century frescoes above, and its crypt of the saint below, is stunning. Open 7 a.m. to noon and 3:30 to 7:30 p.m.; free.

GUIDES

Guidebooks on Italy usually give short shrift to the Marches. But the very detailed Heritage Guide to the Marches, published in English by the Touring Club of Italy, has detailed road and city maps of the larger towns and suggested driving tours. It can be ordered at www.touringclub.com for $16.95.

The Italian Government Tourist Board has offices in New York, (212) 245-5618; Chicago, (312) 644-0996; and Los Angeles, (310) 820-1898. The province's tourism Web site, www.le-marche.com, has lists of hotels, activities and information about the region's culture, cuisine and other topics.

CHRISTOPHER SOLOMON writes frequently about travel for The Times.