From the town square of Castellabate on Italy's Cilento coast, you can raise your eyes over the rim of your cappuccino and sip your drink with a panorama of the sky and Mediterranean Sea stretching from Salerno to Policastro Bay. Far below, the plains are ripe with vineyards, lemon trees, and white figs, stretching up to the green mountain slopes shrouded in foggy vapor.
Standing on the same spot in 1811, Napoleon's brother-in-law, who was appointed King of Naples in the early 19th century, uttered these words, which are inscribed on the City Hall. “Qui non si muore.” Roughly speaking, it means “I won't die here.”
Of course, people die in the Cilento region south of the Amalfi Coast. However, thanks to the Mediterranean diet first studied in these regions, they live longer than most humans. It would be more accurate to say that eternal life is the more attractive proposition here.
Last spring, I decided to explore on foot the Cilento Vallo di Diano Albruni National Park, Italy's second largest national park, which includes both sea and mountains. I based myself in the town of Acciaroli from an Airbnb with a bedroom window facing the harbour. My goal was to “staccare la spina” in Italian, or to unplug. It was early May, so it wasn't crowded in the summer. I woke up at dawn to the sound of pigeons and blackbirds. I swam in the cold silver bay, grabbed a macchiato from the port bar, put on my hiking boots, carried a guidebook called “Secret His Campania'', a trekking app called Comut, and a rented manual. We set off in a Fiat Panda car. .
One of the great things about Italy, at least for non-Italians, is how easy it is to feel like you're in a movie. I felt like James Bond as I drove East from the sea in Viabaccoe's Celere, gearing down the zigzag path as clouds cast shadows on the towering white cliffs. Ta.
Although the scenery is cinematic and spectacular, and the water is as strong as wine, Cilento is not as internationally popular as the Italian playgrounds of Capri and Positano. It's a pretty well-kept secret. Here you can get the same sun and sea for a fraction of the cost, along with important Greek ruins, wild nature, strange legends and medieval religious sanctuaries.
Americans are rare in the area, and many residents do not speak English. The rough-and-tumble atmosphere of the area appeals to certain people. Ernest Hemingway often hung out with the fishermen around here. After World War II, U.S. Army physician Ansel Keys happened to come to the area, purchased an old summer home, and devoted his life to researching the heart-healthy benefits of a diet of olive oil, fish, and fresh vegetables. I did. The fishing village of Pioppi has a museum dedicated to the Mediterranean diet he made famous.
It has long been a wild country. After the fall of Rome, the coastal population here declined. Boars, wolves and bears have taken back the mountains. In the Middle Ages, Christian hermits and monks settled there. Even into the 19th century, the area retained its barbaric reputation. Local criminals became the heroic “Briganti” in the fight for Italian unification, and later formed the mafia that ruled southern Italy.
The Italian warrior tribe, the Lucani, were the first recorded inhabitants of Cilento (the name comes from the Latin “Cis Alentum,” meaning across the Alentum River, which runs through Campania). The ancient Greeks established colonies on the coast, and the magnificent Doric temples of Paestum, which inspired writers such as Goethe and 18th-century architects across Europe, are some of the best-preserved in the Mediterranean. The ancient city's museum displays wall paintings from Lucanian tombs, still-vibrant paints that mutely testify to the mysteries of a vanished religion, including sphinxes, female guides to the underworld, and male warriors.
buffalo country
My trekking plans always had a hidden purpose. To justify devouring Cilento's food and wine. This region produces the best basics of Italian cuisine. Extra virgin olive oil from oak trees, fresh seafood, homemade pasta and sauces, buffalo, cow and goat cheese, and of course pizza. All of this is washed down with local red wine..
The road to Paestum is lined with shops selling mozzarella made from the milk of Asian buffaloes, likely first brought to Italy by the Greeks. On a rainy afternoon, I take a tour of Tenuta Vannuro, an organic mozzarella farm, where men in white coats transform the milk of 200 buffaloes into creamy cheese balls beloved by foodies around the world. The farm itself is outrageously mechanized: the animals are trained to enter voluntarily into self-service Swedish milking machines. Six minutes later, they emerge toward a food treat and an automated buffalo massager.
Cilento and Vallo di Diano Park covers 699 square miles of beaches, cliffs, emerald valleys, river gorges, and mountain meadows, and is filled with marked trails. I walked about 8 miles a day through different zones of the park. I was disappointed that I didn't have time to cycle just one section of the 373-mile Via Silante bike path, which circles the park and stops at various villages each night.
I started hiking along the water's edge. A winding, rutted coastal road connects the fishing towns of the Cilento coast, with only knee-high guardrails standing between cars and hundreds of feet of water. This cliff inspired stories of nymphs who lured sailors closer to the rock where they were shipwrecked. If the sailors do not comply, the nymphs will throw themselves on the rocks for unrequited love.
From the port of San Marco Castellabate, a flat, easy path leads through olive trees and Mediterranean shrubs to Punta Ricosa, one of the mermaid legends. Leucosia is one of his three sirens who tried to charm Ulysses and his men in “The Odyssey.” This great navigator had his men fill his ears with wax and tie himself to a mast to resist the sirens' songs. Unable to seduce her sailors, the sea god Poseidon turned Leucosia into a rocky cliff named after her.
From the cove of Palinuro we take a steep walk along a steep rocky path. Palinuro is a town with countless gelaterias and restaurants, which in the summer mainly cater to Italians on vacation. Go around the mountain to a point overlooking the main Grotta Azzurra (Blue Grotto). Lottery for cave divers.
Even with Komoot (which helped keep me on the path once I was underway), I often had trouble finding trailheads. One afternoon, in a light rain, I spent two hours wandering around the hilltop village of Ogliastro Cilento, searching in vain for the entrance to an impressive-sounding walk called the Sentiero dell'Albero Centenario (Avenue of 100-Year-Old Trees). I ended up not finding the entrance, but I did walk a few miles through olive groves, chased by two friendly farm dogs along the way.
orchid valley
The village of Sassano, deep in the Alburni mountains, is a collection of biscuit-colored houses with red roofs planted on the flanks of Monte San Giacomo and is the gateway to the Valle delle Orchide. In May, in his microclimate more than 100 species of wild orchids bloom. Miles of easy walking trails lead to an amazing sight of tiny pink, yellow, red, and purple flowers on a single stem. These rare flowers were multiplying like dandelions as far as the eye could see.
I got lost driving to Sassano and parked at a cafe bar. Like a photo from the 1940s, middle-aged men sat in a row of chairs under the morning sun. According to my “Secret Campania” guidebook, this is Teggiano, built around a medieval fortress with 25 towers and where one of Cilento's strangest legends was born. During her month-long siege in the 15th century, Teggiano women are said to have breastfed the soldiers to protect them. Active.
A maze of farm roads leads you to the Certosa di Padura, one of the largest baroque buildings in Europe and a former monastery. It's as incredible as the opera house in Werner Herzog's Fitzcarraldo. Among the hidden gems is the library, with its 15th-century freestanding spiral staircase and his 18th-century glazed ceramic floors in blue and emerald green.
For five centuries, Carthusian monks lived here and died in quiet solitude. They spoke only once a week, on Sunday walks in the woods. On the Sunday I visited, the grounds were buzzing with Italian families enjoying a sunny afternoon out. Laughing children were playing hide-and-seek in the shadows of the arched arcade, and older people were drinking espresso and Aperol spritzes at nearby tables.
Certosa is not the only tourist attraction worth visiting in Padula. The Joe Petrosino House Museum celebrates the life of NYPD hero Joe Petrosino. He was an Italian immigrant who grew up in New York City, fought against the Mafia in the mid-20th century, and died in Italy when he was assassinated by villains who came to ally with New York's Mafia bosses.
During my 5 days in Cilento, nothing happened to me. Totally, I was living off navigation apps, Google Translate, bird call identifiers, and of course my iPhone playlists. But I returned to Rome with muddy shoes, a sweatshirt that still smelled like buffalo ranch, and a new appreciation for the Pulchra Terra hinterland. That is Italy.