PUEBLOS OCULTOS DE ITALIA | 13 Pueblos Que Italia Esconde Y Que Nadie Cree Que Existen | 4

There is an Italy that ordinary itineraries rarely show. An Italy of towns built on promontories that plunge directly into the sea, from medieval villages with fewer than 30 permanent residents, of perfect cities designed by a single man in less than three years and of islands where the white of the facades is a collective obligation repeated for centuries. They are not recreations or open-air museums; they are real, inhabited places. with a living history in every stone and every cobbled street. Today we are going to tour 13 of them, The most incredible and impossible villages of Italy that conventional tourism rarely reaches. If you stay until the end, you'll understand why this country has been around for over 2,000 years. being the most extraordinary place in the world to live. Let us begin our journey. Number 13 Taormina. In the northeast of Sicily, on a natural terrace at 200 meters in altitude between the Ionian Sea and the slopes of Mount Etna There is a Greek village that has been choosing the most dramatic setting on the entire island to exist for 2,700 years. Taormina was founded by Greek colonists in the 4th century B.C. and for centuries it was the most important city in Sicily, in a position between the European continent and North Africa which turned its acropolis into one of the most coveted spots in the Mediterranean. The Greek Theater of Taormina, built in the 3rd century B.C. and later expanded by the Romans, It has a capacity for 5,000 spectators and offers a view of Mount Etna and the sea. that opera directors from around the world consider the stage to be the most extraordinary natural setting on the planet. During summer, when the full moon rises above the volcano and the representations are lit only by side spotlights, The theater produces an image that no constructed stage can replicate. The streets of the historic center, with their Sicilian Baroque palaces, your hand-painted ceramic shops and their sea-view terraces, they produce, along each curve, a view that travelers on the Grand Tour described as the most beautiful in Europe. And Mount Etna, visible from almost any point in the town, Remember permanently that Taormina is located on an active volcano. that has been deciding for millennia whether this extraordinary scenario continues or not. Number 12. Varena. A fishing village built where the shore of Lake Como narrows until forming the most photogenic point of one of the most photographed lakes in the world. Varena has been in the same place for centuries. with their ochre and terracotta facades pressed against the water's edge and their alleyways so narrow that in some places two people cannot pass each other without yielding. The Walk of Lovers. A pedestrian bridge constructed directly over the lake which connects the pier to the gardens of Villa Monastero. It is one of the most extraordinary routes in the Lombard region. and the place where the combination of water and snow-capped mountains in the background And the colorful facades create an image that no description can anticipate. Villa Monastero A former Cistercian convent converted into a private residence in the 16th century and today open to the public, features gardens that descend in terraces down to the lake's edge, lined with cypresses, magnolias and lemon trees that have been growing over the water for centuries. From the ferry crossing the lake toward Bellagio or Menaggio, Varena appears as a splash of color against the dark rock of the eastern shore, with the church bell tower emerging above the rooftops with a compositional precision that no photographer could claim. In winter, when tourists disappear and the lake regains its silence, Varena reveals what it was for centuries before the world discovered it. Number 11. Portofino. Just 500 permanent residents and one of the most reproduced images in Italy. Portofino, on the Ligurian Riviera di Levante It has preserved for centuries a beauty that seems calculated down to the last detail. but what is actually the result of geography. Chance and an urban planning regulation that has existed since last century It prohibits any modification that alters the appearance of the set. The small port of Portofino, with their colorful facades reflected in the water between fishing vessels and luxury yachts, It is one of the most photographed urban spaces in the Mediterranean. The combination of yellow, orange, pink, and white with the dark green of the pines covering the surrounding hills produce a contrast that the Ligurian painters of the 19th century immortalized in hundreds of paintings. The town was discovered by the European aristocracy at the end of the 19th century. and ever since has maintained a dual condition of authenticity and exclusivity very few places in the world have managed to sustain for such a long time without losing either one. The trail that from Portofino traverses the promontory as far as the lighthouse at the tip of the cape, with a view of the Gulf of Tigullio in one direction and the open sea on the other. It is one of the most extraordinary coastal walks in all of Liguria. and the best way to understand why this promontory It has been one of the most beautiful places in the Mediterranean for centuries. In the Itria Valley, in the heart of Deep Puglia where the white limestone defines each wall, every path and every structure, There is a village built using a certain technique. that does not exist anywhere else in the world at that scale. Alberobello has more than 1,500 trulli, circular-plan houses with dry stone walls without mortar their conical limestone rooftops rising above the landscape like a fairy-tale village transplanted from another era. The trulli were built without mortar. to be quickly disassembled if the king of Naples sent inspectors to collect taxes on permanent homes, A tax trick of the 16th and 17th centuries which accidentally produced one of the architectural landscapes the most extraordinary ones in Europe. The conical roofs are decorated with painted symbols in lime. whose exact meaning researchers are still debating. Some are of Christian origin, Others are paid, and others are simply decorative transmitted from generation to generation. From the river Nemonti viewpoint, the view of the white stone cones that stretch to the horizon produce an image that UNESCO recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996. Alberobello is a village that seems invented. and yet it has remained completely real for centuries. Walking among its trulli at sunset, when the white stone turns pink, It is an experience that no traveler ever forgets. In the heart of Sicily Iblea, where the limestone of the high plateau fractures in deep ravines that separate hills about which the Sicilian peoples They have been building their cities for thousands of years. with a stubbornness that no earthquake has managed to overcome. Definitely remove it; there is a medieval neighborhood. What is actually a city within a city. Ragusa Ibla is the old part of Ragusa. completely rebuilt in the Sicilian Baroque style after the 1693 earthquake that destroyed the entire Val di Noto region. The Baroque of Ibla is not the exuberant Baroque not from northern Europe, but a baroque of its own, Mediterranean and solar, with golden stone facades that absorb the light of the Sicilian sun and return it amplified at dusk, when the entire people seems to burn from within. Duomo Square, with the Cathedral of San Giorgio in the background and the noble palaces on either side, It is considered one of the most beautiful squares in Italy. and the main setting of the television series Commissioner Montalbano, which turned Ragusa into a cinematic tourism destination recognized throughout Europe. From the viewpoints of the Iblean Garden, the oldest in Sicily, the view of the ravines surrounding Ibla with the new city of Ragusa Superior emerging at the bottom produce an image of a complexity and a beauty found in few Italian cities They can match. A place the world should know much more than you know him. Number 8 Castelsardo. In northern Sardinia, on a basalt cliff promontory that enters the Gulf of Cinara with geographical arrogance the Doria of Genoa recognized immediately the perfect place for a fortress in the 12th century. There is one of the medieval centers best-preserved ones on the island and one of the coastal landscapes more extraordinary of Western Mediterranean. Castelsardo was founded in 1102. as Castelgenovese by the Doria family and changed its name several times depending on who controlled it. Until the Spaniards who dominated Sardinia for three centuries They gave it the name it has today. The Castle of the Doria at the top of the promontory, now converted into the Museum of Intreccio, houses the most important collection of Sardinian weaving A craftsman from Castelsardo I have maintained it for centuries with techniques that are transmitted from generation to generation without interruption From the sea, the image of the medieval town climbing along the promontory as far as the castle with the turquoise waters of the gulf at your feet Send one of the postcards more recognizable of Sardinia. At dusk, when the light of the setting sun illuminate the facades of dark stone and the sea changes color in front of the promontory, Castelsardo reaches a visual dimension what justifies the journey as far north as an island that mass tourism rarely reaches. It is one of those places. that the world would discover if I knew that it existed. Number 7 Bernassa. The most cinematic of the Cinque Terre It does not have a sandy beach, It does not have an access road. and it doesn't have any of the elements what defines a conventional tourist destination. Bernassa has a natural port. with a medieval tower from the 14th century watching the entrance. Colorful houses that rise directly out of the water and a square that opens onto the sea as if the people would have decided to plunge into the Mediterranean and if it had stopped at the last moment Founded by the Romans and turned into one one of the most important ports of the Republic of Genoa In the Middle Ages. Bernassa controlled maritime trade of Liguria with its own fleet that is remembered today only in the street names from the historic center. Doria Tower master the set from the rock what separates the port from the open sea and it has been for centuries being the first visible point for those who approach by water and the last that disappears when the ship moves away toward The horizon. The coastal trail What connects Bernassa to the north of Monterosso and Corniglia to the south. With a view of the sea and the terraced vineyards that the inhabitants they built on the cliffs for centuries patient work. It is one of the routes an even more extraordinary pie from Italy. Bernassa is the town What else does it resemble? to the image that the world from Italy without anyone having planned it. That authenticity That's what no set can provide could replicate. In the region of Basilicata where the hills Lucanian Apennine calcareous formations Create a landscape of an aridity in summer It becomes almost African. There is a city inhabited continuously from the Stone Age and that in the first half of the 20th century She was well known the shame of Italy under the circumstances extreme poverty where thousands of families lived. In their caves excavated directly on the rock The Assidi Matera They are a system excavated neighborhoods on the flanks from a ravine where humans are I have lived without interruption for at least 9,000 years Building a city that grows downward instead of upward. With the houses of the higher levels using as a terrace the roof of those at the lower level in an urban logic that does not exist nowhere else from Italy. In 1952 the writer Quado Liva He described it like a city that looked like hell. What contributed to the campaign that led to the government Italian to evacuate more than 15,000 people of the Assi from 1953 onwards. In 1993 UNESCO declared it World Heritage recognizing that described as misery It was one of the examples. more extraordinary vernacular architecture of the ancient world. Today the Assi They are rehabilitated as hotels restaurants and luxury homes. Matera was the European capital of the culture in 2019 completing a journey from poverty to recognition that no other city Italian has traveled with such intensity. In the center from Puglia where the hills Del Murje They descend gently toward the Adriatic between fields ancient olive trees whose twisted trunk silver defines the landscape with a presence that no other tree of the Mediterranean can match. There is a white city. that from a distance It looks like a cloud resting there on the hill highest point of the horizon. Ostuni called the White Call It bears its name with the lime with which its inhabitants He has plastered every wall each staircase and each vault for centuries creating a uniformity chromatic in those days major sun produce a physical dazzlement. The historic center medieval Ostuni with its streets so narrow that in some The sky is visible only. like a strip above their heads spirals upward toward the cathedral of the 15th century whose facade white stone in the style of late Gothic Rule the town and the olive plain what surrounds it in all directions. The olives that surround Ostuni in many cases they have more than a thousand years antiquity logs of dimensions that no photograph manage to capture completely They are trees. who were here when the cathedral It was built and what follows producing oil. At sunset when the light the Italian sun It strikes the white facades from the west and the shadows They stretch out about the streets paved Ostuni reaches that dimension of unreality what makes Puglia unique deep to one of the destinations more extraordinary from Italy. Pienza in the heart Orcia Valley where the hills of clay Southern Tuscany Create a landscape that the painters from 400 used as background of his dunes and what about today It is protected as heritage of humanity. There is a village built as The perfect city from the Renaissance for a dad what he wanted to transform her native village at a monument to the ideas urbanistic of his time. Pienza It was conceived by Pope Pius II from 1459 entrusting the architect Bernardo Rossellino that would transform the small village of Corsignano In an ideal city. The result It was a square of proportions perfects surrounded by the Papal Palace The Cathedral and the Palacios Cardinal's (or Cardinals') everything built in less than 3 years with coherence stylistics that no other Italian city of the same period can equal. From the garden pendant of Papal Palace that protrudes over Val d'Orcia with a view Pius II described in his memoirs like the most beautiful what he had seen in all his life the landscape of rolling hills. Cypresses and medieval towns on the horizon produce an image for five centuries without changing significantly. Pecorino di Pienza produced in the pastures Val d'Orcia It is one of the most appreciated cheeses from Italy. Val d'Orcia what surrounds Pienza It is the Tuscan landscape in its purest form and the stage that the painters the 15th century chose to frame his masterpieces. Number 3 San Gimignano In the heart from Chianti, Tuscany, on a hill surrounded by vineyards de Vernaxia and cypresses as if painted, There is a village in the Middle Ages decided to resolve their power struggles in the most vertical way possible San Gimignano It has 14 medieval towers. that rise about the town with arrogance architectural that does not have an equivalent in no other Italian city of its size. At the time in the greatest splendor, in the 13th century the town had 72 towers. Each noble family was building her highest one that of its rivals as a symbol of power and wealth, converting the skyline in a competition from my boldness in stone that the time It has reduced to 14 but it has not been removed from the Tuscan horizon. From afar among the vineyards and the olive trees, the silhouette of the towers emerging over the hill produce an image that the travelers The Grand Tour described as the most medieval city from Italy. That description it is still completely valid today. The cobblestone streets. The squares with their stone wells and the churches with frescoes from the 11th century live alongside the towers in a set that UNESCO protect since 1990 and what does it produce to whom it arrives the sensation had they gone back eight centuries The vernaxia of San Gimignano It was the first wine Italian in receiving designation of controlled origin In 1966. San Gimignano It is the test of the human ego, when it is expressed in stone, It can last for centuries. Number 2 Calcata. In the throats from the Treja River, less than 50 kilometers From Rome, where the erosion of the water on the rock volcanic juniper has created a landscape de Torres and cannons making it almost impossible believe that one is in Asia and not in some remote corner from Tuscany. There is a village medieval abandoned completely In 1935, when the government fascist declared your houses inhabitants and four decades later It was recolonized by artists and communities alternatives that converted his abandonment on one occasion extraordinary Calcata It is seated on a rock juniper 40 meters surrounded through a ravine in three of his four sides with a single pedestrian access over a medieval bridge of stone. The combination from that position extreme defense with the houses medieval restored without altering the structure original produced one of the peoples more singular from Asio. The galleries on art, the workshops of craftsmanship and the restaurants that they occupy the ancient ones caves and stables medieval coexist residents permanent that have been maintained I live in a village that bureaucracy Italian had sentenced to death makes almost a century The Natural Park of Treja that surrounds the town with its waterfalls, cliffs juniper and the forests De Robles It is one of the spaces natural less known and more extraordinary from the Roman region. Calcata It is the antidote Perfect for whoever wants it see how Italy It reinvents itself without losing what makes it unique for centuries Number 1 Malsépine On the shore Oriental from the lake de Garda, where the mountains Mount Baldo almost there vertical over the waters deeper from the lake larger from Italy. There is a village medieval that has lasted for centuries being the point where nature Alpina and the water Lake Garda blue produce a combination that no other people from the shore can equal. Malsépine It has a castle. stilts built in the 14th century on a rock that ventures inward in the lake, with its walls emerging directly of the water and its towers dominating so much the lake like the valley that ascends toward Mount Baldo. The spiral castle It was the prison Where is Goethe? He was arrested briefly in 1786 harassed by espionage when I was drawing the castle during his journey through Italy, an episode the German writer told with humor on his trip to Italy and what converted a Malsesine in a literary destination. The cable car what goes up from the village to the summit Mount Baldo over 1,700 meters allows viewing simultaneously the lake from above and the Alps on the horizon in a view that the inhabitants describe how the most extraordinary from northern Italy. The historic center from Malsesine with its alleyways medieval, their fishing boats at the port and the ochre facades that are reflected in the water of the lake at sunset an image that no visitor that he has arrived Up to here He has managed to forget. Malsépine It's the face less known from Lake Garda and the most extraordinary. Thirteen villages what they demonstrate What Italy It does not run out in the destinations more well-known Behind of the images that the world has been reproducing for decades There is a country with many more layers of which tourism conventional arrives to show. Towns that carry centuries in the same place, with the same stone, the same streets paved and the same stubbornness if it exists without anyone He has asked them for permission. to be extraordinary. Some have fewer than 30 inhabitants permanent, others receive millions of visitors per year What everyone have in common It's that none of them cheats. when one arrives up to him. If this journey He left you wanting more to take a flight, I don't like it and subscribe to the channel It helps us to continue exploring the corners more incredible of the planet. Tell us in the comments From which country You're seeing us and which of these Italian towns It's on your list. See you on the next trip.