A stay at Casa Bellav­ista is an expe­ri­ence in total Tus­can immer­sion if it’s bucolic Tus­cany you’re think­ing of, with its gen­tly rolling hills spiky with cypresses, rus­tic ter­ra­cotta archi­tec­ture fur­nished with fam­ily heir­looms, the sun-drenched flavours of good home­cook­ing, etcetera.

Casa Bellav­ista is a real, old-fashioned B&B, a pri­vate house where guests share space with their hosts, who in this case include the fam­ily dogs and cats. Simon­etta Demarchi - for­go­ing a career in hotel man­age­ment — and her hus­band Guido Conti - who still man­ages the exclu­sive Castello di Spal­tenna — restored their coun­try home and its adja­cent barn to open the estab­lish­ment some years ago. It offers four charm­ing bed­rooms and lav­ish break­fasts, superb din­ners by arrange­ment, liv­ing areas indoors as well as a large and lovely gar­den and out­door pool and hot tub.

And Bellav­ista is no exag­ger­a­tion. There’s no room with­out a view up there on a hill in the Val di Chi­ana over­look­ing nearby Cor­tona but also Mon­tepul­ciano, Monte San Savino and Lucig­nano, with Monte Ami­ata in the back­ground and all the agrar­ian ter­rain in between.

Simon­etta looks after every­thing and every­one with a great deal of charm as well as irrefutable com­pe­tence. She runs cook­ery courses around the marble-topped table  in her coun­try kitchen using home-grown or locally-sourced pro­duce, and organ­ises guided vis­its of nearby towns and winer­ies. The intre­pid can bor­row one of the house scoot­ers — of the leg­endary Vespa vari­ety — to explore the surroundings.

Casa Bellav­ista
Case Sparse Creti 40
52044 Cor­tona (AR)
+39 0575 610311 / 335 6383377
info@casabellavista.it