Knowing how to listen is a condition which is necessary so that the territory may reveal itself to those who wish to cross it…

This itinerary permits us to grow acquainted with a natural landscape, unique to Calabria and Sicily, that of the fiumare [streams and rivers], waterways of a torrential nature, fed, for the most part, by rain.

Keeping to the trajectories that water has traced upon the land, we travel along the route pursued by those ancient Greeks who settled in the present-day Villages of Greek Calabria, by following the course of these fiumare, which we may presume, were once navigable for long stretches. While doing so, the traveller will become aware of another voyage, embarked upon more recently, a kind of counter-journey undertaken by the Greeks of Calabria towards the sea, which generated new settlements and new communities, breaking that ancient link with the territory and caused the young to depart for far-off places: this was the march of depopulation which, as in the case of the fiumare, has drained the area of energy.

Whoever is willing to listen, little by little, will realise that Greek Aspromonte continues to speak quietly and through the signs of its tradition, culture, and its identitarian legacy handed down by the people who settled here. This heritage is visible not only in the hamlets and in the ruins of flour and oil mills, wine-making cellars and bergamot laboratories, in the carcare [kilns] which produced tiles, bricks, lime … But we shall also come across places belonging to the people’s new identity: because everyone you meet here has a story to tell.

This trip will help you grasp, with newfound awareness, the truth about places and communities often impeded by arbitrary and unshared developmental choices made. This experience will highlight the close links existing between environmental issues and social distress, but also bring you into contact with some local-development best practices, which, slowly but surely, are restoring newfound dignity and a newfound voice to the Greeks of Calabria and their land.

Participants: minimum 4 – maximum 8

Time: 8 days /7 nights

Arrival in Calabria: at your own expense

Prezzo: €1,180 per person (in double rooms) for a minimum of 4 participants. Extra charge for a single room: € 200

Discount: Groups of 6: 20% (€ 844 pp. ), Groups of 8: 30% (€826 pp. )

The sum covers: Full board with a double room. Water and wine with meals (packed lunch provided, transfer from/to airport /station and during stages of the excursion. Dedicated guide and luggage transfer service.

Day one

Meeting point Reggio Calabria Station/Airport. Baggage pickup and transfer to Condofuri.

Walking eastwards along the beach (Bova Marina) you arrive at the mouth of the Amendolea River where fresh and salt water, cold and warm, sand and stone, citrus groves and pieces of wood transformed by wind and water, all meet. You begin to walk through this evocative habitat where silence is, paradoxically, perceived as if it were a sound This particular silence will disclose and describe the intangible and immaterial character of a landscape as changing as the mood of its inhabitants, and accompany the traveller through stones underfoot, the clinking of goat collars, the swish of water that now you see, now you don’t, and the rustle of the wind …

From here you climb uphill for about four hours to Amendolea, an ancient hamlet and part of the municipality of Condofuri where you will stay overnight at the il Bergamotto rural hospitality farmstead, one of the many places encountered during the journey where the management believes in the social and environmental rebirth of Greek Calabria. You are then taken on a visit the farm’s Bergamot grove.

Day two

Breakfast. Having crossed the river we walk uphill for about three hours to Gallicianò, the ancient Graecanic hamlet where fluent Greek is still spoken. We visit the Orthodox Church and the Casa dela Musica, a project aimed at highlighting the musical identity of Gallicianò while mixing it with other varieties of music. We lunch and dance and go down to Foculìu where we join the river again and return for the overnight stay at the “Il Begamotto” farmstead.

Day three

Breakfast. Walk along the banks of the river as far as Roghudi (4 hours roughly). A visit to this Ghost Town, a symbol of the depopulation of the area. Then, a packed lunch and overnight stay at the Ghoriò di Roghudi hostel. Dinner. A meeting with the young members of the Propentedattilo Association.

Day four

Breakfast. Drive to Roccaforte del Greco (about 30 minutes), a lookout point from which to admire the Amendolea River. Then we visit the Saccà cheese-making firm and the hamlet itself. Packed lunch and transfer to the Menta Dam. From the Dam we hike as far as the MaesanoWaterfalls (about 3 hours) and drive back to Bova. Dinner in Bova at the Cooperativa San Leo and overnight stay at the Kalòs B&B. Meeting with the young members of the San Leo Coop.

Day five

Breakfast. Visit to the hamlet, an Italian Touring Club and Peasant Civilisation [Civiltà Contadina] orange flag [a bit like the Michelin stars assigned to restaurants] . Drive to Campi di Bova and a walk to the Lake (about 1 hour); packed lunch and a round trek during which we view the vales of the Graecanic and Locri areas (about 2 hours). Return to Bova. In the afternoon a visit to the workshop of residential artistic Ceramics, a material that recalls the memory that abides in art, in history, in artefacts and in the age-old traditions of an entire community. Dinner and overnight stay.

Day six

Departure on foot from Bova through the San Pasquale Valley, full of old mills. Packed lunch. Arrival at Bova Marina (about 4 hours) and a visit to the Archeoderi Park and Documentation Centre. Drive back to Palizzi for the overnight stay, which, according to the season, will be either by the sea or on the hillside at the Agunì rural hospitality facility.

Day seven

Visit to the vineyards of the Terre Grecaniche Cooperative on the Stazioni di Ascolto [Listening posts] route with places chock-a-block of identitarian reference points which seek to confer new narrative meaning on the countryside, in such a way as to present travellers and locals alike with exceptional beauty, and make them more aware  of the heritage they find wherever they turn. Dinner and overnight stay at Palizzi.

Day eight

Visit to Pentedattilo, the “hand of Aspromonte”, an abandoned old hamlet, today part of the municipality of Melito Porto Salvo. Five sandstone pinnacles, like the fingers of a hand in whose palm nestles what is left of the old hamlet. In addition to various workshops, it is possible, using the facilities provided by the Majia -Incantesimo Project, to recognise some of the anthropological traits of the Greek Calabrians of our own day, some of their social and economic cultural features, in the mythological heritage of the “cunti” [stories], local tales. Packed lunch. Return to Station/Airport of Reggio Calabria and departure.

It is possible to extend your stay at Reggio Calabria (either upon arrival or before departure ) so as to visit the Museo della Magna Grecia [museum of Magna Grecia], la Sala dei Bronzi di Riace [The Hall of the Riace Bronzes], the Aragonese Castle and take a stroll along the Lungomare Falcomatà [Promenade], one of Italy’s most beautiful waterfronts.