Wildflowers in bloom, the flight of golden eagles, marsicani bears waking up after a long winter sleep, welcome to spring in Abruzzo.
With three national parks, one regional park and around twenty nature reserves offering high mountainous uplands, lakes, rivers, beech-woods and fir-wood forests, this is an area where since the dawn of civilisation nature and people have intertwined, creating a unique environment where, up to these days, wolves, bears and human beings live side by side.
It is a natural link between the north and south of Italy, a land celebrated by the great poet Gabriele D’Annunzio, who was born in Pescara on the shores of the Adriatic.
Abruzzo, or Abruzzi, in the plural, as it was known in former times, is still largely by-passed by mass tourism.
We talked to Alessia and Fabrizio who run a tour operator called Maple & Saffron and take guests around this interesting region, organising special itineraries and cooking classes in Abruzzo, and asked them what they include in their tours.
"History, nature and traditional food, are the three main components to the perfect trip to the area going from the high peaks of the incredible National Parks to the gold sand shores of the Adriatic coast.", they explain.
Medieval towns and villages, history and legends
"Our ideal 'mountain to seaside' itinerary of Abruzzo, includes our incredible historical towns and villages. We think our guests should not miss the chance to visit Pescocostanzo, Civitella del Tronto and Scanno, listed among the most beautiful villages in Italy (Borghi più Belli d'Italia); Sulmona the city of confetti, sugar coated almonds, Teramo, the ancient Roman city of Interamnia (“between two rivers”) famous for the Roman theatre, amphitheatre and Domus and Giulianova with its wonderful beaches."
Beautiful castles and mysterious caves
"Besides the main national parks, these are three amazing locations we propose to visit the area:
- the Salinello Canyon Natural Reserve, an amazing protected three kilometers gorge carved out over time by the river Salinello;
- the Sagittarius Canyon Natural Reserve, a deep canyon between limestone cliffs carved by the river Sagittarius, which today provides shelter for marsicani bears;
- the Rocca Calascio, one of the most beautiful castle ruins and the highest on the Apennines in Italy. The castle is situated in a very strategic position and was used as a military observation point in communication with other neighbouring towers and castles spread along the Adriatic coastline. Moreover, in the 980s, the Rocca charmed various producers and directors who decided to use the fortress as a natural set for various movies: LadyHawke (1985) with Leo McKern, The Name of the Rose (1986) with Sean Connery, and more recently The American ( 2010) with George Clooney, shot entirely in the province of L'Aquila.
Taste and tradition
There is a reason why Alessia and Fabrizio called their company 'maple and saffron', "you cannot truly understand the richness of Abruzzo's culture if you don't try the food", they explain. Now obviously, maple is not a typical Italian ingredient, but it is an homage to Alessia's grandparents who had migrated to Canada, while saffron is the golden treasure grown in Abruzzo.
They take their guests to visit to the Museum of Olive Oil where they can find out how olive oil was made in ancient times and have the chance to taste different types of olive oil.
"We also like to let them try fish, the local baccalà based dishes and the famous arrosticini, world famous Abruzzo meat skewers.And obviously our wine and cheese too! We organise cooking classes, take people herb picking and learn how to make homemade pasta, especially spaghetti con la chitarra, or go truffle hunting."
There are so many options of what to see and what to do in Abruzzo, that they created a special feature called "build-your-own-tour" to allow their guests to build their own itinerary by simply dragging the icons of various options in a simple form. "We have created itineraries which we think include the best of what Abruzzo has to offer, but we think there is so much to see that we wanted to make sure people could find an easy way to set up their own special tour of the region."
Abruzzo seems to be the perfect destination for a relaxed holiday where you can walk and hike taking in the fresh air, enjoying nature, history, culture and food.
You can find out more about Alessia and Fabrizio's Maple&Saffron tours here.
