How did we fancy three months in Perugia and Umbria region of Italy house sitting, looking after a property nestled in the stunning Italian landscape? The property being up for sale, the owners just needed a couple to look after the house, gardens and have it looking it’s best when the agent wanted to show prospective buyers around……how could we resist!
The house was REALLY off the beaten track. A 3 km stoney dusty road, off a small country lane led us down to the house. Literally a 40 minute drive to EVERYWHERE! The property was a huge, beautiful stone house. Renovated throughout to a high standard, in lovely landscaped grounds the house blessed with stunning views that stretch for miles over the beautiful undulating fields. We were never met our nearest neighbours, but, were told they were over the hill and down the valley somewhere! A SUV type car was a must have for this assignment! The house is shown in the picture below.
No pets( got to say we did miss not having any!) but that did give us a lot more freedom, so we didn’t complain too much. As mentioned previously, the house was on the market. Unfortunately, the husband ( who spoke english) required a heart bypass and had suffered a stroke, so they need to sell and move back to civilisation, doctors and hospitals etc. A sad story really, we took the assignment back in February and the owner was ok at the time. They just want sell to make a new life in Germany….all this has happened in the last 2/3 months.
As the husband was unavailable, we arranged to meet his wife for a handover. The house had been empty for a few months so she arrived a day or two before us to air the place and take back control of the garden….which had gone a bit wild. It was an interesting and very quick handover, as she spoke only a little English, German being her native tongue. Most of the instruction came complete with a lot hand gestures and miming actions. She showed us around and 45 minutes later left us to look after the property and gardens for 3 months1
Thankfully, we only had a couple of dramas, one involving a large swarm of bees that set up home, (a large beehive) under the eaves. That had to be ”smoked” and the bees removed. The other involved a 2 metre long black snake (apparently not dangerous!) who visited us in the garden! Tom encountered it when watering the tomatoes….not sure who got the biggest surprise! Thankfully, after all the shouting and screaming that followed, it was not seen again!!!
Being so rural we had quite a lot of wildlife appear at night time -mozzies and biting flies by the bucket load - some rather large porcupines (imagine a bowling ball with lots of spikes) - the wild boar (not that we saw them but you can hear them!). Think there must be a lot of hunter’s around too, as you could hear the hounds out a lot and the odd gunshot sound.
We did have a funny story we thought we’d share which took place on one of our many trips along the road to Umbertide…..
SOoooo, we are driving down a very rural country road in Italy, where we were interested to see that ladies of the night and day (it was 11.30 a.m.!!!!), let it all hang out, as they sit on plastic chairs at the side of the road. We kid you not!
Tom decided to put his foot down to overtake a slow moving caravan (think the driver was enjoying the view!). Tom pulled out and cross a solid, single white line, only to discover two Italian Policemen hiding on the other side. The “Polis” are frantically waving him down with what appeared to be a red ping pong paddle. By this time, we have flown passed (at high speed) and we have to stop 500m down the road in a layby and then reverse our way back to them.
One policeman saunters leisurely over whilst the other little chubby one jumps in their car and drives down to meet us.
“Parliamo Italino”
“ No Parliamo Glesgwegan” says Tom. This clearly did not impress the Officer.
“Licensee Prego”
Tom pulls out his Aussie License. The Policeman’s eyebrows furrow and there is a lot of head scratching (clearly having no idea what this is). “International License?”
“No – Australiano”
“ Hmmm……Auto Papers?”
Tom hands him the French Registration documents (we should point out that we hired the car in Paris and drove to Italy).
This totally confuses him….they are all written in French???
Hmmm… what to do? He has a mad Scotsman, claiming to be Australian, driving a French Car along an Italian road!!!!
Tom politely enquires “What is the problemo?” The Policeman tries to convey that he overtook on a solid white line, this involves him waving his arms around and drawing imaginary lines in the air. “Oh that’s legal in Australia” (lies Tom) and hisses at me to keep quiet my mouth shut….not sure why the Policeman didn’t understand a word we said.
Meantime, the wee chubby Polis guy is writing all Tom’s details down. He too is clearly totally flummoxed having no idea what to do next, he gives in, a shrug of the shoulders and tells Tom that he will take his license if caught again (or at least that’s what we think he meant). With a smile to the nice Policemen, a quick “Grazie Mille, Arrievedercie” we drove off “sedately” into the sunset, wondering if Tom’s now had an Italian Criminal Record!!!
Thankfully we did not cross their paths again!
We enjoying our downtime in this beautiful part of Italy, exploring the local countryside, enjoying the medieval festivals and markets. We spent time gardening, relaxing, swimming, working on a suntan and reading a mountain of books from the ‘library’ and on our kindles. Peace and relaxation. That said, with limited Wi-Fi and only German/Italian t.v, and no one else round it did make is realise that as rural and beautiful as this location was….we are not really country bumpkins!