Bella Via Stories — Bella Via Travels

Italy

Pompeii: A City Frozen in Time

Of all the places I have visited in Italy, Pompeii is one that has stayed with me in a particular way. Not the grandeur of it — but something quieter. The sense, as you walk its streets, that the people who lived here walked on these same stones.

By Jill Kathleen

Italy

Rome: Seven Visits and Still Not Enough

Seven visits to Rome and it still hasn't given up all its secrets. There is always another street I didn't walk down, another church I didn't step inside, another tiny restaurant I wish I had tried.

Italy

Why I Love Agriturismos

There is a version of Italy that exists beyond the grand hotels and crowded piazzas — found at the end of a winding country road, where vineyards stretch across the hills and a host pours wine before dinner.

France

What Normandy Does to You

We booked a week in Normandy with a clear purpose: to stand on the beaches and understand something of what happened there. What we did not expect was how much the rest of the region would give us — the towns, the food, the particular quality of the light on the bocage in the late afternoon.

Ireland

A Thousand Welcomes: The Irish Pub as Living History

From snugs in Belfast to a hauntingly beautiful session in Kilkenny — the Irish pub is far more than a place to drink. After visiting well over fifty pubs across Ireland, we are still discovering something new each time we walk through the door.

Italy

My First Trip to Italy: Rome, One Bite at a Time

The Hotel Forum sits right beside the Colosseum. On our first night we did a food tour through Trastevere — supplì, trapizzino, aged balsamic, pasta, gelato, and a couple from Hungary we did not expect to meet. Rome won us over before we had even seen the inside of the Colosseum.

By Brian Garza

Italy

Puglia: The Italy You Were Not Expecting

Whitewashed trulli, olive groves older than memory, and a coastline that shifts from turquoise to deep jade. Puglia rewards the traveler who arrives without assumptions and leaves with a completely different idea of what Italy can be.

Italy

Umbria: Italy's Quietly Perfect Secret

A four-course cooking class on the Tuscan border, two nights strolling Perugia's medieval streets, and a private winery tasting in Gubbio with focaccia still warm from the oven. Umbria rewards the traveller who takes the time to move through it slowly.

Italy

Tuscany: Why We Keep Coming Back

There is a light in Tuscany in spring that does something to you. The cypress rows, the stone farmhouses, the wine that costs nothing and tastes like everything — we have returned four times and still feel like we have not seen enough.

Germany

Bavaria: Beer, Castles & the Road Less Driven

Yes, there is Neuschwanstein. But there is also a back road through the Allgau with no other cars, a brewery that has been in the same family since 1630, and a village square where the afternoon simply refuses to end.

Italy

The Italian Dolomites: Europe's Most Dramatic Landscape

The peaks turn rose-gold at dusk in a phenomenon the locals call enrosadira — the alpenglow. We watched it from a rifugio terrace with a glass of local wine and said very little. Some things do not need commentary.

Ireland

Irish Castles: Stone, History & the Art of Staying Put

Ireland has over thirty thousand castles — ruined, restored, and everything in between. We spent a week sleeping in two of them. The drafts are real. So is the feeling that the walls have something to say.

Ireland

Donegal: The Wild Edge of Europe

Sea stacks, bog roads, and a coastline so raw it feels like the world ends here. Donegal is Ireland at its most elemental — windswept, unhurried, and completely unforgettable for those willing to make the journey north.

Ireland

The Wild Atlantic Way: Driving Ireland's Edge

Two thousand kilometres of Atlantic coastline, from Donegal to Cork. We drove it over two weeks in May — stopping often, doubling back when something caught our eye, and sharing the road with sheep through Connemara. The road does not rush you. The landscape will not allow it.