the prosecco road (not taken)

Venice draws close to six million visitors a year. Less than an hour north, the hills growing the grapes for its favorite aperitivo see almost none of them.

Venice earns every one of those visitors — it's Venice, and you should see it at least once in your life. I went with my extended family a few years back and can honestly say a gondola ride at night there was one of my top travel experiences ever. But, yes, it's full of tourists. And, yes, it's expensive. If you want to take a break from those crowds, and see Italy at its most authentic, one must be willing to take the road less traveled by and veer off the traditional Venice–Florence–Rome–Positano axis.

For a destination worthy of that diversion, I submit the Prosecco Road. Formally the Strada del Prosecco e Vini dei Colli Conegliano Valdobbiadene, it's one of Italy's oldest wine routes — a roughly 50 km ribbon through the Prosecco Superiore DOCG hills between Conegliano and Valdobbiadene, in the province of Treviso, Veneto, just south of the Dolomite mountains. The hills earned their UNESCO World Heritage status honestly: terraced vineyards too steep for any machine, still pruned and picked by hand, the way they have been for generations. The landscape does the selling for you — checkerboard rows of vines climbing and dropping with the slope, medieval villages, half-hidden castles, pockets of forest between the vineyard blocks, roads quiet enough to hear your own tires on the gravel. In short, an underrated paradise for food, wine, and cycling enthusiasts.

I've been aiming to explore the Prosecco Road for a while now, as a fan of both its bubbly and scenic cycling roads. In the meantime, I've been relegated to virtual simulation on my Rouvy bike trainer in the basement. But when I found out my niece was headed to Venice this summer as part of her graduate studies, I jumped at the chance to craft an itinerary to serve as her much-needed weekend getaway and as my reconnaissance mission. What she found confirmed my target — the kind of escape, and the kind of destination, that's become the core of my focus — off the beaten path, active, luxury travel in Italy and beyond.

My niece and her partner stayed at Villa Abbazia, a 5 star Relais & Chateaux property with a Michelin recognized restaurant in the middle of Follina, a quaint and quiet little village along the route. Through my agency's preferred partnership, they got a room upgrade and breakfast included, and the hotel arranged their transportation from and to Venice. The highlight of their trip was a guided e-bike tour with Italy Cycling Tour, a local group of former professional cyclists and the latest addition to my list of trusted local tour operators. Their cycling route was a mix of gravel and peaceful roads with no cars, trails beautiful and not too difficult in the heat, their guide super fun, the e-bikes excellent. The tour stopped at Serre di Pederiva, a family winery that's grown Valdobbiadene Prosecco Superiore DOCG on the steep hills for two generations — the kind of place where the same hands that pick the grapes pour the glass. They shipped bottles home, and I can't wait to try. In town, their dinner was a short walk to Osteria del Majo — amazing food, amazing staff, their words.

Off the beaten path isn't a compromise. It's simply a better deal. Villa Abbazia — the upgrade, the breakfast, all of it — ran roughly half what a comparable hotel would cost in Venice, Rome, or Florence over the same dates. The restaurants and the tour price out the same way for something just as good, sometimes better. Then there's what money doesn't buy directly — room to move. No lines, no timed-entry tickets, no elbow-to-elbow crowd at the viewpoint. Just open road and quiet. And the businesses haven't been worn down by tourism — they're still genuinely excited to greet you, the real thing, not a performance for a tour bus.

This is part of an ongoing effort — finding and curating the best destinations, hotels, cycling routes, and experiences for my clients, one region at a time. Thanks to my niece's confirmation, I have a new hotel partnership, a new outfitter, a new winery, a new destination I can now recommend with confidence.

So, by all means, see Venice. I have some great hotels and experiences to suggest. But please also consider tacking on a few extra days to get off the beaten path. 

It can make all the difference.