The last Doge of Venice, Ludovico Manin,
retired to this area at the end of the eighteenth century when the Venetian
Republic fell to the blows of Napoleon Bonaparte.
These days, whoever visits Villa Manin in the province of Udine, detects a hint of twilight
in the air, almost as if the memory of the old gentleman who came here to pass
the autumn of his life was influencing the visitors and inducing a melancholic
mood in them. But this is a pleasant sensation, that leads to a more intimate
and intense kind of aesthetic enjoyment.
Udine - Palazzo del Comune
The same sensation recurs all over this
beautiful and severe border region of Friuli, where almost every town boasts a museum
- those of Udine, Tolmezzo, Pordenone, Cividaledel Friuli, Gorizia, and Aquileia are particularly important and interesting
- and is able to surprise with the plurality of architectural styles. In the center of Udine the Venetian Gothic of the Palazzo del Comune faces the beautiful
twentieth-century Art Deco Caffe' Contarena. Cultural attractions are also
remarkable, as at Udine again, where galleries of historic and modern art are numerous.
Highly suggestive is the Basilica in Aquileia, now a small town but once an
important city of the Roman Empire.
Gradoin the province of Gorizia is the favorite
of many tourists who regularly return for its sea and particularly healthy
climate.
Trieste, in
tiny Venezia Giulia,
is the most "middle-European" of Italian cities, rich in history and culture, with
its important ancient and modern artistic heritage, has been loved and
represented by great literary figures like James Joyce, Italo Svevo, Umberto Saba and many others.
And don't forget the mountains, in Friuli you can
enjoy summer and winter sports in beautiful mountain surroundings.
The Dolomites of the Carnia region are very well
known and famous, Tarvisio and Sequals are two of
the villages most frequented.
Very special is the "Widespread
Hotel": The idea of the popular/widespread hotel stems from the need to
safeguard and recover the existing building heritage; houses, stables and
old farmsteads have been restored and today they stand as structures which
are in harmony with the environment and the urban layout of these
centers. You have to stay in an old original building, perfectly restored to
modern standard, with all the amenities of an hotel while savoring the
feeling of ancient times.
Friuli - Venezia Giulia
The same sensation recurs all over this
beautiful and severe border region of Friuli, where almost every town boasts a museum
- those of 
