Assisi sits on the western flank of Monte Subasio, and the first thing you notice is the colour. The stone, quarried from the mountain itself, is a pale pink-white that glows at sunset, and the whole town seems to hang off the slope above the Umbrian plain. It was the home of Saint Francis, born here around 1181, who gave up his father's cloth business to live in poverty, and the town built one of the great pilgrimage churches of Christendom around his tomb. The Basilica of San Francesco has two layers of frescoes by Giotto and his circle, and was badly shaken by the earthquake of 1997, when part of the vault fell. It reopened after careful restoration, and UNESCO listed Assisi in 2000.
Down below, around the great domed church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, is the busier modern settlement, with the Porziuncola, the little chapel that Francis rebuilt with his own hands. Rivotorto, a few kilometres away, is where his first brothers lived in a hut. That is the useful geography: the old town up the hill, parking and petrol on the plain.
Motorcycles are a good way to arrive, because the narrow old centre is restricted and bikes are easier to place than cars, though you will have to walk. The road up from Santa Maria degli Angeli is straightforward. A better ride is to head up over Subasio itself on the minor road that climbs to the Eremo delle Carceri, where Francis and his friars used to retreat to pray in the woods. The surface is mixed, the bends are tight and blind in places, and it can be misty in spring and snowy in winter. Late spring and early autumn are the sweet spots, when the plain is green or gold and the crowds are thinner.
Practicalities are easy. Santa Maria degli Angeli has the larger shops and pumps, and Assisi's own lanes are full of places for coffee, a plate of strangozzi pasta with truffle, or a slice of torta al testo, the flatbread stuffed with greens.
Go quietly, and if you can, be there when the day trippers have left and the bells begin. It is a town that deserves an evening.