Spring festivals
Anyone disappointed by the lack of fuss over Valentine's Day in Italy could always check out the Festa di San Marco in Venice on April 25th.
The holiday is commonly used as an opportunity to celebrate love and romance. It's also called the Festa del Bocolo, bocolo meaning ‘red rosebud’ in Venetian dialect, as it's traditional to give a red rose on this day.
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At the end of April, a festival in Umbria celebrates a unique tradition. The townspeople of Narni created the Corsa all’anello festival in honour of the town’s first bishop, Saint Giovenale. Riders on horseback try to snag a golden ring on a lance to win bragging rights for their district. Expect medieval costumes, feasts of pork and flowing wine.
Calendimaggio is a medieval festival held in early May. The spring rites, celebrating renewal and rebirth, date back to the ancient pagan festival of Floralia, in honour of Flora – the Roman goddess of flowers and fertility.
Events include processions, archery and crossbow competitions, flag-waving displays, music and dances.
Terni, in the central region of Umbria, stages a Carnival-style float parade on the evening of April 30th, while Assisi, also in Umbria, puts on one of the most popular Calendimaggio celebrations.
Gardens in bloom
It’s high season for blooming flora, and you’d be remiss not to check out one of Italy’s many historic gardens.
A particularly magical botanical garden, Giardino di Ninfa was once a medieval town, but it was abandoned in the 14th century. It wasn't until the 1900s that the remains were rediscovered and transformed into a botanical garden.
Today, plants are entwined with the ruins, and you can cross the castle's moat to see inside. The garden opens for the season on March 21st.
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Festivals dedicated to flowers, called infiorate, are held at the peak of spring, when blooms are at their most colourful. In towns across the country, streets are decorated with carpets of flower petals arranged in intricate designs.
The Infiorata di Noto in Sicily is one of the most celebrated in all of Italy. Other notable infiorate include those in Rome, Spello and Genzano.
Easter celebrations
The two weeks leading up to Easter (Pasqua) are among the busiest times of the year in Italy – especially in Rome, as pilgrims travel to the capital for Holy Week.
But elsewhere as well, the Easter period is marked with rituals and traditions sometimes dating back hundreds of years.
As a predominantly Catholic country, there are still plenty of cities and towns that carry out religious ceremonies for Easter. Via Crucis (‘Way of the Cross’) processions are common, with the most popular one taking place in Rome, traditionally led by the pope.
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Florence is home to one of Italy’s oldest and most iconic Easter traditions, though it has nothing to do with the crucifixion or resurrection.
Every year on Easter Sunday, a cart packed full of fireworks is pulled from the Church of Santi Apostoli to the central Piazza del Duomo by four white oxen. There, a dove-shaped rocket (the so-called colombina) flies into the cart via a cable, setting off a firework display overhead.
The scoppio del carro (literally, ‘cart explosion’), which is thought to date as far back as the early 12th century, is attended by hundreds of residents and visitors every year.
‘Little Easter’ trips
After the excesses of a large Easter Sunday lunch with all the family, the preferred way for many Italians to spend Easter Monday, known as Pasquetta, is with friends, taking a trip fuori porta to a nearby town or village.
While the major cities will be packed with international tourists, Italians themselves usually prefer to escape the hustle and bustle and take in a different part of their country.
Italy celebrates its most beautiful villages (or borghi) every year with an annual ranking named I Borghi più belli d'Italia ('the most beautiful villages in Italy') which many people use for inspiration for these weekend escapes.
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Picnics in the park and barbecues (grigliate) are also common activities on Pasquetta, weather permitting.
Hiking and nature walks
After a cold, rainy (or snowy, if you’re in the north) winter, the warming temps of spring defrost an urge to be outdoors in nature.
Italy offers untold numbers of hiking and walking routes, with something for ramblers of all ages and abilities. There’s nature, walking paths, wildlife and cultural sites to be found in Italy’s 25 national parks.
Spring is a particularly good time to hike in the southern parts of Italy, before the heat of summer makes anything but swimming unbearable.
There’s the Murgia Materana Park in Basilicata, the Great Cono path up and around Mount Vesuvius in Naples, and the forests of 350-year-old pine trees in Calabria’s Sila National Park, to name only a few.
Seasonal dishes
Spring in Italy means the mercati are overflowing with artichokes (carciofi) and asparagus (asparagi), and lamb (agnello) is the favoured meat on most menus.
Artichokes in particular are the star of spring plates.
They’re so popular that many locations around the country have entire festivals dedicated to them. For instance, Ladispoli, west of Rome, holds a carciofo festival that’s dedicated specifically to the romanesco variety of the vegetable; it will take place April 10th–12th this year.
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