AWOL from Nascondiglio di Bacco, in the Sibillini mountains with Bacco

 Starting the hike out right with a big drink and a cool down.  This is a drinking fountain for the local sheep and from this point, about 2 km from the trailhead (unless you drive up to this point to save yourself some work, the road isn't at all bad)

 Bacco, taking time to smell the flowers

 The flowers on and around this trail were spectacular and nearly in full bloom

 Bacco on the summit of Sasso Borghese

 And the next stop, the top of Palazzo Borghese

 And finally, the summit of Mt. Porche

 This is a view of Castelluccio, the home of the famous lentils and beautiful flowers, now showing.

 A look down into a canyon below Mt. Porche

 A view of Sasso Borghese in the left foreground and Palazzo Borghese to its right with a saddle between the two, our first 2 summits and in the distance you see Mt. Vettore to the left and Cima del Lago and Mt. Redentore to the right.

And this is how Bacco ended his hike, in another fountain

30 Giugno
Bacco and I played hooky yesterday as I had worked something like 16 days straight and needed a break.  We or I decided to climb 3 peaks, Mt. Porche, Sasso Borghese and Palazzo Borghese, all above 2000 meters. The flowers are just incredible now and will be in full bloom for at least another week.  You can add a visit to the plateau of Castelluccio with the hike and get your flower fix, for sure.  The hike takes about 2.5 hours to scale the 3 summits and an hour and fifteen minutes for the return.  You will be adopted by families of flies, but they don't bite and hang around waiting for the sheep which graze in the mountain pastures.  There are excellent views of the Sibillini mountains, Lake Fiastra, the plateau listed above and one can see all the way to the sea, into Abruzzo and Lazio and of course, Umbria.  It is a nice hike and except for some scree in the early going which is tougher on the descent, not too difficult.  I headed first to Sasso Borghese, then backtracked for Palazzo and Porche, although the last one might be better to scale first as it is the most difficult.

"Lost" the new season now filming in the Marche and Abruzzo, starring Bacco and me

29 May, 2011
Episode 3:  Recap, Bacco and I have tried 3 hikes on 3 separate Sundays and have become 'lost' each time,  1st week-20 minutes, 2nd week-30 minutes and this week-75 minutes!
Today we crossed the border into Abruzzo and the twin brother park to the Monti Sibillini in the Marche called Monti della Laga.  The book about the hikes is in italian and is called le piu' belle escursioni or the prettiest hikes, by Alesi, Calibani and Palermi.  I chose hike 6 named the forest of the fable which begins in the little town of Quintodecimo (which sort of translates as 'half a town') better known for its autovelox (fixed radar camera which will catch you if you are driving more than 50km/hr.) The town is about 40 minutes from Nascondiglio di Bacco on the Salaria or ancient roman salt road which served as the prime means of transporting salt from Rome to present day Porto dAscoli.
The sentiero or trail follows the river Noce Andreana into a series of "V" shaped  valleys past some picturesque waterfalls and finishing at a grotto with a veil of water in front and a pair of old stone buildings beneath the outcropping.
You park in the town in a little plaza by a church and immediately head up a series of stairs which lead you to the last house in town and a gravelly road which you will follow for about a mile past the locals' gardens, little vineyards and stalls.  The book tells you "where the road ends and you find a cement bridge, the real trail begins and heads off to the left".  That's  all fine and was probably that way in 2005 when the book was written, but now the road does not end there.  Luckily, my intuition and the cement bridge encouraged me to take a path to the left which has a Monti della Laga national park sign in front of it, and indeed, that is the correct way.  See below.

After a pretty nice little climb, you arrive at the first waterfall, which when you have a trusty sidekick flat coat retriever along, will be explored, pools will be entered and thirst sated, not to mention photos snapped.  This can be your downfall as from the pool just beneath the falls,

you naturally want to continue the hike from a level which is above the correct trail and nature has provided a little alternative trail which perfectly conforms to the description in the book (a bit smaller and covered with leaves).  Bacco and I trekked the next 75 minutes into a side canyon along another of those infamous wild boar trails (very well maintained, I might add) and probably ended up on top of Mt. Ungino where we found an old apparatus which must have been used by loggers to lower the huge logs down the steep hill with intact cables, rotting timbers anchor trees long since dead, etc.

We made our own trail back down and I am not saying I didn't have a grand old time exploring this hidden area, but it is a bit hairy hanging on to trees while you descend a steep slope with no bearings.  Anyway, having been born "testardo", inheriting stubbornness from my father,  I was determined to finish the real hike.  I found the 1st waterfall and then found the trail we had used to arrive, whereupon it was really easy to see the correct trail veering off to the right and 10 meters below the infamous false trail.  From there it is just 20 minutes up to the very nice little cascata with its little sheltering cave behind.  

This photo is a little waterfall before the grotto falls

The view from inside the grotto

If you don't mess up, the ascent should take an hour and 15 minutes to slightly longer and the descent 55 minutes or a bit more depending on your pace.  Not a bad hike at all for a morning or afternoon jaunt.  Bacco enjoyed the water and I enjoyed the topography, the dense forest and the isolation as we were once again the only ones on the trail. 

The photo above is what the true trail from the first falls looks like with plus or minus 91 trees to step over or stoop under.

Last phot reminded me of a petrified dragon killed by St. George with a spear in its head or maybe a very large Abruzzese unicorn

The area seemed to have zones similar to those in MO with karst structures although I saw no sinkholes or arches. Take lots of water and a snack in case you want to audition for the next "Lost" episode from Abruzzo.

Norwegian junior cycling team at Nascondiglio di Bacco, World junior cycling championship at Offida

20 Agosto
I am trying to catch up on blog posting.  We were the fortunate hosts of the Norwegian junior bicycling team who voyaged south to Offida, Le Marche of all places for the junior bicycling world championship.  They were a great group, 12 in all with coaches, trainers, cooks and riders and I was able to snap photos of most during either the time trial or road race.  I can tell you, our Fiat Doblo has a hard time with the hills these young men and women raced around.  The top finisher for the squad was a young man who snagged 10th of 130, I believe with youngsters  from plus or minus 55 countries, including Namibia.  All the Norwegian males were in the top 40 for the road race and was the only squad to finish 4 in the top 40.
As you can imagine our meager breakfast of homemade breads, jams, dessert cakes, yoghurt, etc wasn't enough to fuel their engines, so they augmented our fare with stuff that would make a good supper for most of us.  There were a few cases of road rash, but otherwise no serious injuries and we are hoping to see many of them again next year for the European junior championship.

Beef stew, "ship wrecks", decapitated dolls and ski boots on the beach

8 Feb
Buon weekend! It is too muddy to hoe, tie or prune the vines, so Bacco and I took off for the beach this morning. We went to the "strange section" which is not tidied up in the winter and is free from people who might dislike being jumped by my wet flat coat retriever. He had a batch of fun fetching sticks and if you need a little joy in your life, just come on by and you can play with Bacco on the beach. He just loves to swim, jumps waves taller than he is and generally just has a ball playing.
You can see some of the sights from the zona Sentina including a poor doll's head who lost her corpo, the wrong kind of "ski" boot for the beach, and a boat docked in a mode I had a bit of trouble imagining as it was well above the high tide mark.
It was warm today, so hopefully our land dried out a bit and I can exercise my back and arms with the hoe tomorrow. We had our 1st guests of February this weekend and they seemed content with Nascondiglio di Bacco.
The pictures show Bacco leaping over the incoming wave (sorry it is blurry) and body surfing, a perspective of how far the Sibillini mountains are from the beach with horses in the foreground and the above strange sights.
Have a great week and don't forget Valentine's day is Saturday.
Finally, I am americanizing Raffaele with beef stew and a 99 Woodward Canyon Merlot, can't wait!
d

La Fortezza di Civitella del Tronto (The fort of Civitella del Tronto)

26 gennaio, 2009
Well, around here, when we get a couple of hours of sunshine, it is time for a celebration or a roadtrip. Bacco and I decided on the latter today and visited an interesting site 30 minutes from Nascondiglio di Bacco in neighboring Abruzzo.
I was cleaning some shelves with our tourist information when I came across the brochure for this fort which I have seen from the road to Teramo a few times, but never visited. Descending from here into the valley of the Tronto river, thus the name, we then ascended into St. Egidio alla Vibrata and then followed a beautiful stretch of narrow highway to the town of Civitella del Tronto.
I parked at the city entrance and Bacco and I walked into the main square with its little Monday morning market, then headed up, WAY up to the fort. As Bacco hasn't been properly trained on scale mobile or escalators, we had to climb the stairways instead. Luckily, Bacco was welcomed inside at no charge, but his owner was asked to pay 4 euros. The fort was well designed and full of cisterns to provide water during sieges and was located at the border between the Papal states and the kingdom of Naples. It is about a half kilometer long and was built in the mid to late 1500's. After the kingdom of Naples, it was controlled by the Bourbons, but was destroyed during the battles for italian unity in 1861. Its walls were destroyed to prevent reuse of the fort, but has been in the midst of reconstruction as an historical site since 1985.
Inside are churches where mass graves of killed soldiers are located, soldier's quarters, secret passages, cisterns, long tree lined streets and all in all a great place to play hide and go seek!
It has great views of our neck of the woods, Ascoli Piceno province as well as Mt. Piselli and the hills of Abruzzo.
It makes for a nice visit and a bit further on, one could make a day of it with a visit to Teramo and lunch in Campli at Locanda del Pompa, where those most faithful of blog readers will recall I enjoyed a nice lunch with my friends from Taiwan.
I am spending the rainy, muddy days improving my mind, watching "The Teaching Company's" lecture series on Dark Energy and Dark Matter ( and for any of you who have problems getting to sleep, I highly recommend this dvd set) and also History of Ancient Rome. There are definitely some things you aren't exposed to in a small town high school and a 6 year medical school, so I am trying to make up for my lack. I must say, I am learning a lot of new stuff about subatomic particles. When I last studied this stuff, there were just neutrons, protons and electrons. Now there are up quarks, down quarks, neutrinos, all sorts of anti-matter, MACHOS, WIMPS & possibly Higg's bosons as well. Wow, science has just passed me by!
If you have free time, mud time or vacation time, I highly recommend one of the series of college level lectures they provide: everything from fine arts and music to science, philosophy, religion, history, business and economy. There are always big sales at various times of the year of every topic, which is the time to buy your favorite. Check them out at www.theteachingcompany.com
Here is the slide show of my daytrip to The fort of Civitella del Tronto
The pictures are of Offida and Ripatransone wayyyy in the distance from the Abruzzan hilltop of Civitella, a new favorite Bacco photo and an abandoned farmhouse below the fort.
dds