Description of the attraction
The Campo dei Fiori Natural Park, created in 1984, spreads over an area of 5,400 hectares in the hills of the province of Varese and in the plain of the Po River. In the northwest, it borders with Valcuvia, in the east with Valganna, and in the south with the city of Varese. It consists of two mountain ranges - Campo dei Fiori and Martika, which are separated from each other by the Valle Raza valley. The geographical location and geological features of the area contributed to the formation of a wide variety of ecosystems in the park - chestnut and beech groves, swamps, peat bogs, small lakes, rocks covered with flowers, etc. In addition, there are some historical and architectural landmarks in the park, for example, Sacro Monte, Albergo Tre Croci del Sommaruga and Rocca di Orino.
Campo dei Fiori essentially consists of six protected areas - the Lago di Ganna and Lago di Brinzio lakes, the Torbiera Po Majur and Torbiera del Carecca peatlands, the Campo dei Fiori mountain range with its sheer cliffs and vast forests and the Martika Chiusarella massif. You can get to know all these territories by walking along one of 16 hiking trails specially designed by the park's staff. During the hike, you can see the real wonders of nature - the Cheppo spring, a small lake Motta d'Oro, Tagliata pond, Pezeg waterfall, caves, of which there are more than 130, and Valganna gorge.
No less interesting are the man-made attractions of the park, for example, the Liberty-style Poretti brewery, created at the beginning of the 20th century, or the small old villages of Brinzio and Castello Cabiallo. In Velate, the ruins of the Monastery of San Francesco, founded by Franciscan monks in the middle of the 13th century, have survived, and in Valganna, tourists can visit the Hanna Abbey with an octagonal cloister of the 13-14th centuries - in the 11th century there was a small chapel on this site, which soon turned into a Benedictine monastery. Finally, on the territory of the Campo dei Fiori park there is a city founded in the era of ancient Rome and became the spiritual, artistic and cultural center of the Borromean era - Santa Maria del Monte. Today this town with its ancient chapels is included in the list of UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Sites.
Other attractions in the park are historical villas - the 18th century Villa Recalcati in Varese, surrounded by the park Villa Teplitz in Sant Ambrogio, Villa Ponti with an English garden and a lake and Villa Della Porta Bozzolo, famous for its Italian garden with stairs, fountains, painted frescoes of the ark and the ice storage.
