Motovun

Motovun is the postcard hill town of inland Istria, a cluster of stone houses and bell towers crowning a steep conical hill, ringed by two rings of medieval walls and looking out over the Mirna valley and the dense forests that produce the region’s white and black truffles. It is the town most people picture when they think of Istrian interior.

The walls, dating in parts to the 13th and 14th centuries, circle the town in two bands, and you enter through a gate and climb a covered staircase to the highest square, where the church of St Stephen and a Venetian bell tower stand. The view from the walls over the Mirna valley is the reason most visitors make the climb.

Motovun is the centre of Istrian truffle country, and the restaurants and konobas of the town and the villages around it serve them through the autumn and winter season. The town also hosts a long-running summer film festival that screens films on the terraces below the walls.

For photographers, the silhouette of Motovun on its hill is the classic image, best from across the valley in the evening when the stone glows. Park below and walk up, the streets inside are narrow and steep.

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