Montefiascone

Once upon a time the whole region was full of volcanoes. Lake Bolsena is the large crater of a former volcano; Montefiascone dominates it, 600 m high. From its fortress, built and fortified in 1207, the view is breathtaking. It's as if the lake, the hills with olive trees and vines, the bluish mountains enclosing the plain were the natural frame of an ideal park.
In the town you can still see remains of the Renaissance, palaces, squares often with a church in the middle and small, secret gardens. More subdued, in fact removed from the city walls, is San Flaviano, an architectural jewel from the XIIth century, made of two superimposed churches, with the beautiful fresco of San Flaviano, riding a white horse and holding a flag with the cross. In the third chapel you find the tombstone of the German nobleman Giovanni Fugger who, on the road to Rome in 1110 following emperor Henry V, wanted to go through Tuscia on a private "wine itinerary" of his own.
A faithful servant preceded him, in charge of tasting the wines in the inns and giving them marks: "Est", that is "here the wine is good". When he reached Montefiascone, the wine was so good that the servant wrote "est" three times. Hence the name of the most famous wine of the area, the white Est Est Est.