The forest is deep and ancestral like the era that saw it grow. It leads you towards an undergrowth of moss and green scents like a soft belly. A body of water appears unexpectedly in a basin among the beeches, the result of an ancient spring and the hand of holy and clairvoyant men. The Lake Traversarifrom the name of the father prior who has mid-15th century he designed it, it was a kind of living pantry: a farm of eels, carp, tench to vary the otherwise vegetarian diet of the monks in the surrounding area. Camaldoli hermitageon the hills of Arezzo, which Saint Romuald founded around 1025. A place of meditation, interfaith dialogue and spiritual energy that will be fulfilled next year. thousand years.
READ ALSO: Casentino: what to see, between villages, hermitages and enchanted forests
Casentinesi Forest National Park: a treasure of nature
To immerse yourself in nature and breathe the magical atmosphere of this forest, there is another possibility in addition to the traditional visits and walks: become a volunteer of the Park and continue the work of the monks who, it can be said, were the first ecologists.
“In the Middle Ages, silver firs were also planted in these beech forests, which were used to make the masts of ships,” explains Stefano Severi, forest guide at the Casentinesi Forest National Park. “But for every tree cut down, the monks of Camaldoli planted ten more.”
Today in Casentino Forests, UNESCO heritagelives in the highest concentration of deer, suede, deerThis can be seen in the fregoni, incisions on the trunks that these animals, when losing their horns, make with their stump to remove the velvet that covers it and absorb the antiseptic resin.
Hollow trunks are more likely to shelter orange-bellied alpine newtan excellent bioindicator of the purity of the place. Its guardianship began in 1959When Sasso Fratinoan area of the Park located on the border with Emilia-Romagna, has become the first integral nature reserve in Italy.
READ ALSO: Casentino, the kingdom of silence
Maintenance and protection of the Casentino forests
But if man does not intervene in an integral reserve, much remains to be done to maintain the rest of the Park in good health and its very delicate biodiversity which, as the attitude of the monks teaches, is beneficial for all.
“That's why the Park Authority is managing the project Volunteers by naturehosting in a house on the edge of the forest people willing to assist the Forest Carabinieri”, explains Severi who of the project, in collaboration with the Cooperative Au Calmeis responsible. “You can choose to dedicate three to ten days in 10 annual teams of 14 or 15 people.”
The project Volunteers by nature
Tasks range from fencing off portions of forest to allow undergrowth to regenerate to clearing sections of the 600 kilometres of trails; from maintaining the park's small stone shelters to monitoring wildlife.
To participate in the project, you must pay a fee of 50 euros for insurance costs and the provision of some basic necessities.
When to volunteer in the Casentinesi Forest National Park
It is difficult to say which is the best season to live this experience. If in summer, when the sun's rays barely penetrate the thick branches of the trees. Or in autumn, with the palette of colors that fills the eyes.
If in spring, when we learn to recognize wild herbs as the monks of Camaldoli did, for whom the forest was food for the body and mind. Or even in winter, when the forest changes color and the cold releases the magic of galaverna, a phenomenon by which the wind freezes the fog on the branches of the beech trees, crystallizing it into white needles.
READ ALSO: Winter in Tuscany: three destinations to be reborn, between paths, woods, spas and hermitages
Living a stay in this forest is not just an escape from the city or a vacation; it is like entering the invisible assembly of those who, today as a thousand years ago, have seen their souls touched by ancestral power of nature.
This happens in the mists that rise vaporously on the paths. Some tell stories, with panels illustrating the territory and its inhabitants, animals or plants. Like that of Camaldoliamong the giants of the forest, the silver firs and the hundred-year-old chestnut trees. Or like that ofAcquachetabetween spectacular waterfalls and the remains of an ancient village where there was a hermitage where Dante stayed.
Unique experiences in the forest
This also happens in the darkness of the night, when, assisted by guides, you learn to get lost in order to make a journey.visual deprivation experience which sharpens the sense of smell and hearing.
Or during firefliesin the woods or among rows of lavender, toasting with a beer to these living and luminous magics, possible only in pristine environments.
ALSO READ: Discover Arezzo: churches, museums and nature reserves. For a weekend of history and hiking trails
Where to taste real monk cuisine
Anyone who lives here cannot ignore the connection with the Forest, “place of silence and heart”This is how Filippo Baroni defines it, a young chef who, with his wife Marta Bidi, has made it his mission to safeguard the “sacred” recipes of the monks and to bring the forest into the Mater Restaurantname of the one who generates, like the forest.
“My cuisine is ancestral, almost primitive, like the intimate bond between man and nature,” he says. This is why he felt the urgency to involve the forest guide Stefano Severi, an expert in edible plants, in his excursions into the beech forests in search of mosses, lichens, resins, mushrooms and herbs that are found in his dishes.
What the undergrowth does not provide is cultivated in the garden by Lorenzo Ostrogovich, a former diver from the island of Elba, bartender at the Mater with the inspiration of an alchemist who puts it to good use with his vegetables and herbs, nasturtiums, marigolds, helichrysum.
READ ALSO: Journey through the pleasures of Tuscan cuisine: where to eat and what
Essences, herbal teas and aromatic herbs from the forest
Emanuele Tellini was also seduced by this inviolable land and, a follower of biodynamics, he cleared a hill where he now cultivates medicinal plants without irrigation, because the intense aroma is the reaction of the plants to water stress. Prepare essences, herbal teas and dried aromatic herbs according to the medieval method of Benedictine monk Valafrido Strabo.
His farm is a kind of agricultural organism, according to the monastic model in concentric centers. “The house in the center and a series of circles around it, according to the needs,” he explains. “First the animals, then the medicinal herbs, then the cereals and fruits. Out of the forest, which breaks the wind and maintains the temperature in the inner circles.”
Want to stay up to date on the world of travel?
In the Sacred Forests of Casentino, men, nature and spirituality are unique. The realization of the saying everything fits together.
