Southern Italy
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CALABRIA
Part of the southern regions of Italy, Calabria comprises the toe of Italy’s boot – a great place for experienced travelers to discover. The capital of Calabria is Catanzaro. Lined with mountains and situated between two seas (Tyrrhenian and Ionian) with 500 miles of coastline, Calabria has remained an undisturbed, unspoiled paradise, full of both ancient mountaintop villages and newer seaside towns. It is a peninsula that measures 150 miles long and just 20 miles wide at its narrowest. Calabria is separated from Sicily by the Strait of Messina, and has been under the reign of just about every civilization you can think of -- Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Aragonese, Normans, Spanish, French, Bourbons. No point in the region is more than 31 miles from a coast. This often-forgotten land offers something for everyone from art and culture to world-renowned cuisine and its fresh, simple ingredients directly from her mountains and seas. |
CAMPANIA
Campania is a region celebrated for its climate, the fertility of the lands, and the astonishingly beautiful landscapes. The territory is mostly gentle hills. Mt. Vesuvius on the Gulf of Naples is one of the very few still active volcanoes in Europe. The two beautiful gulfs of Naples and Salerno with the Amalfi Coast, separated by the Sorrento peninsula, are world-famous for the high cliffs, sandy bays, grottoes and islands (Ischia, Procida, Capri), each view an enchanting postcard picture, surrounded by crystal clear blue water. The city of Pompeii was established in the 12th century B.C. and enjoyed great prosperity from the point of view of culture, economy and city planning until 79 A.D. when the terrible eruption of Vesuvius covered everything in lava and small stones and buried this ancient Campania town with a seven-meter high blanket of ash and lapillus. The many archeological digs that have been going on for decades have discovered many of the monuments that survived the disaster. This is a site not to miss while visiting Campania. |
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SICILY (SICILIA)
The Mediterranean’s largest island, Sicily, consists of miles and miles of vineyards rivaling any in Tuscany or Piedmont, endless olive groves sprouting from emerald-green carpets of grass, forests of shiny citrus and fruit trees, rugged silver mountains, all against a backdrop of the deep blue sea. It is also home to Europe’s greatest natural wonder, Mount Etna, a spectacular active volcano. Its nocturnal fires and lava flows leave a stream of steam and light in its wake. Sicily also has a massive amount of world-class art, ranging from Greek to Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Norman, French, and Spanish, and some of it enjoys the most astonishing setting, abandoned on a hillside or nestled into a deserted cove where you can come upon it so naturally that you almost think you’ve stepped into a time machine. The world's first multicultural society, Sicily is Italy's (and Europe's) most historically cosmopolitan region, having been ruled by Asians, Africans and Europeans. |
SARDINIA (SARDEGNA)
This region is a unique island in the center of the Mediterranean Sea (just south of the French island of Corsica). It is the second largest island in the Mediterranean Sea after Sicily. It can be reached easily from Rome by plane (about a 1-hour flight) or ferry. The island has a mountainous interior, steeped in tradition, with spectacular rugged coasts. The interior is characterized by impervious mountain zones containing wide green valleys covered by scrub, a grassy land with a mixture of myrtle, serpillo, India figs and dwarf oaks. To the northeast the mountains stick out along the coast, La Costa Smeralda (or Emerald Coast) is a sophisticated and trendy stretch of coastal resort towns and harbors where the jet-set like to see and to be seen. Other coastal areas are rich in splendid sea, bays, isolated inlets, hidden grottoes, rock out-croppings as well as stretches of white and pink sand. It has a vibrant cultural heritage. |
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BASILICATA
Positioned in the “instep” of the boot that is Italy, this southern region is as a whole mountainous, the highest point of the southern Apennines being Monte Pollino ( 7325 ft). Monte Vulture, in the northwest corner, is an extinct volcano ( 4365 ft). The mountainous terrain made communications difficult until modern times, and Basilicata was one of the least developed provinces of Italy. Basilicata also used to be one of the poorest regions in Italy, but has become significantly richer over the past few years because of the discovery of oil. The region’s food is based on a typically Mediterranean diet of local production foods, rich in the use of olive oil, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella (di bufala, which is of a specific cow that thrives best in dry, mountainous coastal settings such as Basilicata offers), lemons, fresh vegetables, pasta and of course, wine. |
PUGLIA
Located in Italy’s heel, with more than 500 miles of coast on two seas, the Adriatic and the Ionian, Puglia has all sorts of gorgeous beaches. Puglia has some of the brightest seas, most diverse art and architecture, most mouthwatering peasant cuisine and kindest people in all of Italy — including strangers who will go out of their way to lead you to one after another stunning beach on impossibly lapis-lazuli waters. No other image says Puglia better than the trullo, a rural home that's essentially a whitewashed teepee of small limestone slabs stacked without mortar, with a cone surmounted by pagan or religious symbols. They are scattered among olive groves and huge prickly pear cacti in the Valle d'Itria, inland in a triangle between Bari, Taranto and Brindisi. An interesting fact: Puglia is Italy’s region with the largest olive oil production. |
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MOLISE
The Molise region is the second smallest region in Italy after the northern alpine region, Aosta. Molise has yet to be discovered, so it's a region worth visiting before tourist hordes descend. The Molise is sometimes referred to as "between the mountains and the sea" as the small region contains both a little seacoast and a mountainous center. Situated south of Abruzzo, The Molise is noted for its cheeses, its regional cuisine and its rural atmosphere. |