This morning we left from our home in Lecce to reach Sweden.
We have arranged a home exchange with a Swedish family who live in Täby outside Stockholm. The Swedish friends reach Cerchiara di Calabria and we will spend two weeks in their home.
Here we just arrived in Stockholm: we salute Leif and his family. They are very nice.
And after a short trip and a dinner of salmon with dill and a good French champagne, we begin to enjoy the surroundings of the house.
Trebisacce is a seaside resort on the Calabria Ionian coast.
It has a very clean sea and was awarded with the blue flag for the quality of the sea water. The beach is almost wild, but you can find some useful showers.
Is a great place to swim in the sea and sunbathe quietly: the beach is never crowded.
If you arrive here, as we did, from Cerchiara, remember to switch from Piana di Cerchiara and buy from the bakery “the blonde” an excellent focaccia. There are many tasty flavors. We chose the vegetables: delicious but very digestible.
These are the new windows of our house in Cerchiara: the view is even more beautiful and charming.
We were finally able to spend some time at the sea.
We had been in Gallipoli and the magnificent colors of the Ionian Sea have enveloped us.
A first swim in the sea and Francesca was able to show off her new green sunglasses.
It was very hot and we were not the only ones who need shade. This cute dog was lying under our umbrella, it was cooled and then he returned to his wanderings.
Recently we spent few days of vacation in Cerchiara.
The scenery is magnificent in this period: the colors of spring, which goes towards the summer, are beautiful.
The yellow of the broom predominates everywhere.
And we could not resist the temptation to snag a picnic and to get acquainted with some nice cows.
The Romito Cave:
It preserves the ancient and beautiful graffiti of the Primal Ox which shows the presence of man in this area already 20,000 years ago.
RAFTING IN THE NATIONAL POLLINO PARK:
It ‘a stream unique for its picturesque beauty, the richness of the waters, made possible by its perennial karst inflows, is exalted among the gorges and limestone walls.
The town is known worldwide for its “Sassi”, recognized in 1993 by UNESCO as World Heritage. They are original and ancient clusters of houses carved into the limestone, near a deep gorge, the Gravina.
The Sasso Barisano, turned north-west edge of the cliff, if we take as reference the Civita, the center of the old city, is the richest. The Caveoso, looking to the south, is placed like a Roman amphitheater, and perhaps takes its name from the quarries and classical theatre. In the centre a rocky outcrop , called Civita, separates the two Sassi. You can find the Cathedral and the palaces above it. Together they form the old town centre of Matera.
The Matera Sassi is a settlement resulting from various civilizations and human activities over thousands of years. They date from a prehistoric Neolithic village, that was the habitat of an oriental rupestrian civilization, which is the substratum of urban Sassi, with its walkways, piping, tanks.They had a further development into a western-Norman Swabian civitas, with its fortifications, till the expansion during Renaissance,when some baroque buildings were built.
Matera has great importance in the production of traditional typical handicrafts , especially popular with the working of paper mache, pottery, and wrought iron.
The inhabitants are ethnic arbëreshë, and still preserve the ancient language, customs and traditional greek-Byzantine rite.
The houses and the streets are decorated with traditional Albanian frescoes.
The road that leads from Cherchiara to Plataci is very beautiful.
Tourist center, with a castle overlooking the sea.
In Roseto roses were cultivated , whose petals were used to fill mattresses on which the Sybarites slept.
It is currently the main tourist resort on the Ionian Cosenza area . The stony-gravelly beach has mainly free access.
In Roseto Capo Spulico, the emerald clear sea offers amazing underwater scenery.Now it is considered the pearl of Calabria and it obtained ministerial appreciation as the most beautiful sea of Italy.
An ‘Anvil’ Rock is located along the beach below a castle, which is perched on the small promontory at the end of the seafront of the Achaeans. It is popularly called the fungus Castle (you can see the shape of a mushroom) and it is the holographic symbol of Roseto and Upper Ionian Cosenza Province as it is present in many prints and postcards.
The typical cuisine of local seafood is savory. Among the products,the best known is the “spicy” chili.
The village people are among the historical Albanian communities in Italy. Civita is called the Devil’s Bridge village; its landscapes are defined among the finest in Calabria.
In Civita, old Albanian is still spoken fluently , because the inhabitants belong to Albanian ethnic and language minority in Italy, recognized and protected by the Italian state.
The oriental style is mostly evident in the churches: the Arbëresh celebrate the Byzantine liturgical functions in Greek and retain the evocative symbolism with ancient Eastern Christian gestures and songs in Greek and in Albanian, together with Orthodox vestments, sacred icons, mosaics and the iconostasis.
In the old part you cannot avoid to notice several different chimneys,from the simplest to the most ‘artistic’ depending on the social status of the Albanian families. You can admire the Church with its precious Byzantine mosaics and the iconostasis, the sixteenth century chapels of Consolation and St. Anthony . The Ethnic Arbëresh Museum, in the center of the village, is very interesting.
Civita is a tourist centre known for its natural beauty, the Devil’s Bridge, ‘ Gole del Raganello’, ‘ Timpa del Demanio’, and the Pollino National Park . The Mountains are superb and suggestive. The Raganello canyon is absolutely fascinating.
Civita gastronomy is original and with strong character, as it has traditional Albanian dishes influenced by the vibrant Calabria cuisine.
mycerchiara 