Motovun

The path around the wall runs 1050 metres and passes through two gates. Whichever way the eye turns, vineyard and forest fill the valley below.

Dogs work the oak wood beside the river to find white truffles. Where a dog scratches at the scent, a person digs the rest out by hand.

A fifteenth century cannon and stone shot sit inside the upper gate. Old units of measure are cut into the wall beside it, where market goods were checked.

A renaissance church designed by a Venetian architect stands on the square at the summit. The front was never finished, so the brickwork remains exposed.

An abandoned narrow gauge line became a cycle route that still uses its tunnels and bridges. The grade winds around the hills, so the climbs stay gentle.

With roughly twenty residents it calls itself the smallest town in the world. Two lanes make up the place, and 3 minutes carries a walker across the whole of it.

From the north wall, mist settles low along the river each morning. Hill villages appear to float above it like islands.

Eleven stone works carved with an old Slavic alphabet line the road toward Hum. Each letter is cut large with a note of what it stands for.

In July a screen is hung in the walled square and before the gate for showing films. The seating is stone steps, so many people borrow a cushion.

It faces across the valley from the opposite hill and keeps frescoes in its loggia. So few people are about that footsteps are the only sound in the lanes.

A hill village that became a town of artists in 1965, when empty houses were handed to painters and musicians. About twenty small galleries and studios open along its lanes. In summer a youth music camp runs, and instrument practice drifts out of the windows.

A Mirna valley village just below Motovun, full of truffle shops and restaurants. In 1999 a 1.31kg white truffle dug from nearby woods set a Guinness record. Through the autumn truffle season, weekend fairs weigh and sell them.

An old spa fed by a sulphur spring rising beneath a tall rock cliff in the Mirna gorge. Its former Italian name was Terme Santo Stefano. The water smells strongly of sulphur, and your swimsuit keeps the scent for a while.

A hill town up the Mirna river from Motovun, known as the town of truffles. Its medieval core survives on the hilltop, with truffle companies in the newer town below. A round of the European Hill Climb Championship runs on a road nearby.