Today, we will offer you ideas of how to engineer a perfect three-day discovery trip to an unfamiliar destination.
For starters, make sure that the three days are really three different days, not the same day played on repeat. One way of doing this is to assign different types of sightseeing activities to each of those days.
We, for example, often start by going for a hike or at least a longer walk, searching out something that is in some way characteristic for the town or the region, something that you cannot find in your home town or a cookie-cutter municipal park.
It would also help if that part of your travel itinerary brought with it a slight element of risk: you should leave your comfort zone far enough to feel a little murky in the morning about what you are going to undertake, uncertain whether everything will be going well. (If you only ever bring home pleasant memories from your travels, you are nor taking enough risks.).
And in the somewhat likely event that you survive unscathed: having mastered the challenges of your adventure will cast its shine on the rest of your stay, putting a spring in your step and filling you with confidence for the smaller challenges you are bound to encounter as you go along.
On the next day, explore your surroundings and go for a tour of historic sites and buildings in the old town of your destination.
After that, Day Three should be like a dessert: sweet, colourful and weightless. This is the time to do something easy and playful.
For us and our trip to the Langhe region, this was the excursion to Neive, a certified member in the club of Italy’s Most Beautiful Villages.
Unusually for Italy, this is a denomination you can trust. Most Italians that we know in our home region (which spans both sides of the Franco-Italian border) have no faith in virtually any regulation that is observed and enforced by a board of trustees in their home country and gently sneer at people who do.
All Italians that we know, for example, buy their organic foodstuff in France. The same people, on the other hand, would not hesitate to make a detour for a visit to one of the Borghi I Più Belli.
We ourselves have visited quite a few of those villages over the years, and all of them were beautiful. Neive proved to be no exception.
Historic Neive is a hilltop village, a 15-20 minute walk away from the station in the modern town centre (which you can reach through hourly connections from Alba that alternate between trains and buses; the latter leave from stops opposite the train stations).
Your efforts, however, will be rewarded by an introduction into the charms of Italian showpiece villages. They certainly know how to welcome visitors.
For an introduction into Neive’s more particular charms, you have to move a little further up. The town was built like an amphitheatre, in concentric semi-circles that were carved into the hillside.
This makes for an unusual and enchanting street pattern. Side streets meet each other while winding up the hill …
… or are connected by steep ascents.
The amphitheatre shape of the historic village also guarantees, well, dramatic effects. The landscape lies at the foot of the village: this ensures you get great views …
… and, on the other side, allows you to peek behind you from the top level of the theatre – the Upper Circle in English theatre parlance – into the Barbaresco valley.
While on the lower levels you can turn around for a U-rated upskirt view of the town’s tightly woven urban fabric.
Neive provides a great insight into how the Borghi i più belli present themselves: all picturesque motives have been accentuated by flower pots or the like …
… with the clear intent of attracting the attention of cameras – who will then spread the seeds on Instagram and blogs (such as the one you are reading now) to fertilize the soil of people who are checking out promising destinations for their next holiday: people not unlike you, dear reader.
So all of us are parts of the chain that produces experiences for visitors while keeping alive the places that produce these experiences.
This is the Great Circle Of Life, as Africa’s best-known philosopher king so famously said.
To sustain this chain, from which we all benefit in different ways, we must do our bit to uphold the delicate balance between all the living creatures that hold it together. It is our duty, in other words, having enjoyed our visit, to leave some money behind in Neive, preferably by lunching in one of the town’s fine restaurants. Mufasa would be happy with you.
Incidentally, such a lunch may also open the door to another way of enriching your travel experience: it would be a good idea to conclude your three-day-trip by eating something you may not have eaten on the other nights of your three-day-trip, never mind something you would rarely or never eat at home.
After all, the dining table is the place where even the generally risk-averse are given the chance of discovering their adventurous side. Given this is the last day of a three-day trip: the chance for creating unforgettable travel memories may not return for months. Do not let it pass you by!
