June Events in Marche

Description: Piceni's festival (folk-historical commemoration in costume) is related to the old rite of the holy spring of the Italic people. Festivities are elaborate and include a jousting tournament.
Date: Pentecost
Web Link: www.provincia.ap.it/Monterubbiano/
City: Monterubbiano
Province: ASCOLI PICENO


Description: Palio di S. Giovanni Battista - two weeks of delightful entertainment as the neighborhoods engage in a multitude of competitions between them that put the city back in the middle ages. Costumes fill the street with color and the smells of food and wine mix with the strains of music that follow the wandering minstrels up and down the streets that are lined with stalls. This town has been famous for making paper since 990 and you can still purchase the finest writing paper from Le Cartiere Miliani (a factory in operation since 1782) at a store called Cartoleria Lotti (operating since 1735), located at Corso della Repubblica 42. Write your letters about the palio on this paper and you'll never be in danger of being 'one-upped' again in your life.
Date: the last two weeks of June
Web Link: www.pasadena.it/palio/home.htm
City: Fabriano
Province: ANCONA


Description: The Attic in the Street - a gathering of collectors, antique buyers and artisans that display their wares on corso Mazzini between 2 p.m. and midnight on the second Saturday of every month. 0736-256956.
Date: the second Saturday of the month
Web Link: www.grottammare.com/grot_uk.html
City: Grottammare
Province: ASCOLI PICENO


Description: Sundays Without Cars Initiative (or Cities for Children in some places) - a fresh air festival politically initiated by the environmental minister Edo Rondhi in collaboration with the European Union in the year 2000. The effect is that private cars in most major cities in Europe are prevented from operating in the town centers on locally-determined Sundays of each month (some cities prohibited cars on all Sundays). The purpose is and was to draw attention to, and to reduce, air pollution. Most of Italy's largest cities participate in this anti-pollution ban including Milan, Como, Bologna, Florence, Turin, Genoa, Rome and Venice.

Smaller cities will be incited to participate in the ban as time passes because they can draw from a massive government fund. Free money has a big allure in Italy. Estimates put the decline in general activity at 20 to 30 percent less than normal as citizens peddle, skate, walk and take public transportation (usually without charge) for the day. The consequence of being caught downtown in a car without a good reason (the chances of which are not small but usually not speaking the language counts as a good reason) is that violators are usually fined around a hundred bucks and forced to abandon their vehicles until after the hours of the ban which are usually from eight in the morning to eight at night. Having a hotel reservation downtown counts as a good reason also, but you need to have proof of your reservation ready to show the authorities. Taxi travel is the best way to get around because they are allowed to circulate with unprecedented freedom of movement.
Date: actual dates are published just prior to the bans and there are a myriad of variations depending on the local government's conscience (some cities prohibit cars on ALL Sundays for example). Check here or ask around...
Web Link: www.ilsole24ore.it/ambienteonline/apiedi_guida.htm
Note: National Initiative that will be enforced with varying degrees of discipline depending on the locale

Description: Antique Market in the Chiostro di San Francesco and adjacent streets with over a hundred merchants that display their aged wares.
Date: the third weekend of every month
City: Ascoli Piceno
Province: ASCOLI PICENO


Description: Infiorata del Corpus Domini - over 20 giant images made out of flower petals make up a carpet that covers over a thousand meters of the main street (corse Italia).
Date: Corpus Domini
City: Castelraimondo
Province: MACERATA

Publication Date: 2002-06-02
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=1395