Planning a Trip

Getting There

By Train -- The closest station is at Fossato di Vico (tel. 075-919-230), 19km (12 miles) away on the Rome-Anacona line. Ten trains run daily from Rome (2 1/4 hr.), and nine daily from Spoleto (40-60 min.). Nine daily buses (six on Sun) connect the train station with Gubbio (30 min.).

By Car -- The SS298 leads north from Perugia through rugged scenery. The most convenient parking lot (pay) is off Piazza 40 Martiri. There's also free parking off Via del Teatro Romano on the south edge of town and at the base station for the funivia, outside the east walls.

By Bus -- ASP (tel. 075-922-0918) has 11 buses Monday through Saturday (four on Sun) from Perugia's Piazza Partigiani (1 hr., 10 min.). ASP also runs a daily 8:10am bus from Assisi's Piazza Matteotti to Gubbio (50 min.).

If you're coming from the north, you'll probably have to change in Umbertide, from which there are three daily ASP runs to Gubbio (45 min.). From Florence, take the daily 5pm SULGA bus (tel. 075-500-9641; www.sulga.it) to Perugia, where in 40 to 70 minutes (no connection on Sun) there's an ASP connection to Gubbio. The total traveling time is 3 hours. Monday through Saturday, there's a 4pm SULGA bus from Rome's Tiburtina station (3 hr., 20 min.).

Buses to Gubbio arrive at and leave from Piazza 40 Martiri. Tickets are available at the newsstand on the piazza or at Easy Gubbio.

Visitor Information

The tourist office is at Piazza Oderisi 6, a wide spot on Corso Garibaldi (tel. 075-922-0693 or 075-922-0790; fax 075-927-3409; www.comune.gubbio.pg.it). It's open Monday through Friday from 8:30am to 1:45pm and 3:30 to 6:30pm, Saturday from 9am to 1pm and 3:30 to 6:30pm, and Sunday from 9:30am to 12:30pm and 3:30 to 6:30pm; October through March, afternoon hours are 3 to 6pm. The website www.easygubbio.it also has lots of good info.

Festivals & Markets

Gubbio is a festival sort of town. The biggest annual bash, the pagan Corso dei Ceri on May 15, is one of Italy's top five traditional festivals. At 10:30am, a dense crowd packs into Piazza Grande to watch the solemn and inscrutable ceremonies atop the steps of the Palazzo dei Consoli. They involve the mayor, the bishop, three teams of burly young men in colorful silk shirts, and the keys to the city. Suddenly the teams go inside the palace and come charging out with three giant wooden battering ram-like objects called ceri, or "candles" -- possibly after Ceres, the goddess of the harvest, in whose honor this race may once have been run.

With the 15-foot-long candles lined up against the panoramic edge of the square, the teams slip into one end of each a pair of perpendicular poles and attach small statues of St. George, St. Anthony, or the city's patron St. Ubaldo to the other end of each candle. Then each team captain climbs up the poles of his candle and is handed a giant painted ceramic vase full of water. At 11:30am, men hanging directly onto the bell tower's largest bell use their body weight to start it swinging and ringing -- the signal to raise the candles. The three captains give a shout, and as their teams leverage the ceri (candles) upright, the captains heave the water-filled jugs as far as they can into the crowd. The mass of people parts briefly to let the vases fall and shatter, then descends on the shards in a mad frenzy to acquire a piece -- it signifies good crops and good luck for the next year. The candles, now upright, each topped by a saint, and shouldered by the teams, are run three times around the piazza, and then taken off on a long prescribed route through the city streets.

At 2pm, the teams leave the candles on Via Savelli della Posta and return to the Palazzo dei Consoli, where they sit down to an enormous seafood banquet in the medieval hall. At 4:30pm, there's a solemn religious procession of the relics of St. Ubaldo and the ceri as they're carried to Via Dante. At 6pm, the real race begins. The teams grab their candles and make another frenetic run through town. With candles swaying and people cheering, they race again around Piazza Grande and then hightail it up to the gate to the mountain road. After a brief pause, the teams pick up their candles and, perhaps the most stupefying part of the whole day, begin running like the devil straight up the mountainside. It's more than 300m (984 ft.) of vertical elevation along a switchbacked road, but they reach the finish line at the mountainside basilica of Sant'Ubaldo in under 6 minutes. The first one inside the front doors tries to shut them before the losers get there. But -- and this is the best part -- the whole race is fixed. St. Ubaldo always wins. The real contest is to see how many times the runners let their candle fall; those that touch ground the fewest times are the real winners of the day.

The last Sunday in May marks part one of the annual face-off between the archers of Gubbio and those of rival Sansepolcro in the Palio della Balestra. At 5:30pm, before the main crossbow competition begins, sbandieratori come out to practice their mesmerizing flag-tossing. The accuracy and skill of both Eugubian and Sansepolcran marksmen are legendary, and the city that doesn't win the palio prize banner has a chance in September at the rematch in Sansepolcro. At 7pm, there's a procession through the streets, which are lined with people in colorful medieval costumes.

The Gubbio Festival brings performers of international status to town for 3 weeks of mainly classical instrumental music in late July. Also during this period, the city sponsors classical music concerts in the grassy ruins of the Roman theater. During the Torneo dei Quartieri on August 14, the city's crossbow sharpshooters duke it out, and there's flag-tossing and a historic procession -- a warm-up for the competition against Sansepolcro 3 weeks later. Gubbio shows off its revered albino tuber at the White Truffle and Agricultural Fair from October 29 to November 2.

The Guinness Book of World Records votes are in: Gubbio is officially home to the World's Largest Christmas Tree, formed by more than 800 lights zigzagging up Gubbio's mountainside to a star at the top. Every December 7, the town's forces of good taste fail to keep someone from throwing the switch on this monstrosity, and it's left on until January 10.

On the last Sunday of every month, there's an antiques market on Piazza 40 Martiri, where the regular weekly market is also held on Tuesday.