car necessary for stay at Agriturismo
 

I have been reading so many nice things about staying at the Agriturismos in the Tuscanny and Umbria countryside. Is a car necessary to get to these lovely out-of-the-way places?

Yes

I concur !

I have actually stayed at an agriturismo that didn't need a car. But it was just using the 'agriturismo' label to describe a B&B in the suburbs of a medium-sized town.

Which said, though, my British microtown is stunningly pretty and rural, but its B&B's still have terrific public transport links. And we're regularly on this board advising people how to get to more remote places still by taxi from the main railheads.

Although Italian rural public transport is generally appalling, there are some buses (though often going only a couple of times a week), and there are nice places only a few miles by taxi from some of those useful out of town mainline railway stations like Orvieto Scalo. In fact I'm sure I've seen 'agriturismo' signs just a few miles east of Orvieto Scalo station.

The question is how to track such places down. Personally I've never bothered: why would you not drive to them? Is it worth browsing or posting on www.slowtrav.com?

We loved having a car to explore the area around our argitourismo. We were able to see it from different vantage points and we really loved going to the markets in the little nearby towns.

http://www.castelloluzzano.it/eng/homeing.htm

In a nutshell yes, but you may find some that will pick you up from the Airport and drop you off there. This assuming that you intend to spend your holiday on site at the Agriturismo like a kipper by the pool enjoying wine and food on site and perhaps a swimming pool for two weeks. Many do and there's nothing wrong with that.

Still, if you want to explore you can take a look at the information about what goes on beyond the agriturismo' walls here:
http://www.tuscany-villas.co.uk

Enjoy your choice, whatever it turns out to be :)

With few exceptions, an agriturismo is by definition in a rural, agricultural setting, so yes, a car would pretty much be necessary unless you lucked out and found one accessible by public transportation, which is unlikely in rural Italy.

But even if you did find one that was accessible without a car, what would you do once you got there? Just hang out on the farm? That's fine if that's what you're aiming for, but you might go stir crazy after a few days. In any event, I should think a car would be a great idea no matter how much time you wanted to spend at the agriturismo - surely you'd need to go get stuff to eat and so forth at some point.

I rented a car today via AutoEurope. Thanks for all your input.

Good decision. Enjoy all those "lovely out-of-the-places".

You will do great.
The freedom of starting and stopping when you want is so much more fun.