Frontal assault on the senses.

Smell, taste, indulge in flavors: Hardly anyone knows the wild, beguiling in Pollino Nordkalabrien - and this is a shame. Nowhere else can you feast as well, through canyons and experiencing nature up close, as in Italy's largest national park.

 

Giuseppe looks grimly through the car windscreen, "Where the hell is this supposed to be?" He asks offended and typing on the paper with the address of the "Agriturismo Acampora." Behind him rise the mountains of the Pollino massif in the sun sky, between us hangs the scent of honey and bitter herbs.

"Give me the number," he bids kramt and gruff in his denim jacket after the mobile phone. In the rough dialect of the mountain people he chats with a lady at the other end of the line, then his face brightens at. "I bring you out," he was still buzzing and is already with his pitch-black Vespa disappeared behind the curve.

In madcap pace is 350 meters up the switchbacks, faster, until finally Giuseppe fully meets the brakes in front and an old farm with a very steep ramp to stop coming. Good mood, he welcomed a small, suntanned woman in the antique rose knit sweater - House mistress Maria Francomano, as it turns out, someone knows that he knows, and thus something of a family member. Maria mustered their new host by the cautious side, and then kindly invited to dinner.

"The outrageous good fortune, to be born here"

All make it to the covered terrace and comfortable blink in the sun. "Glorious", Giuseppe sighs and looks over the valley a few miles distant beaches of the Ionian Sea. Meadows, thickly forested hillsides, sheep and shepherd dogs dominate the picture, it smells of shrubs and herbs unknown. The first almond trees begin to bloom, the earth räkelt after the long winter in the sun.

ITALY-QUIZ

Corbis

Do you belong to Tuscany Group? Italy is the favorite destination of Germans and their country of refuge and longing. What do you know about the unique relationship between the two peoples? Find out in Reisequiz!

"Thank God back in the homeland!" Three decades has spent Giuseppe in Milan, as a bricklayer and carpenter earns his money. Now he's finally returned after Calabria, "where the olives grow in your own garden and caves to invite bathwater."

Rosa Maria's daughter shares his enthusiasm. "I was simply outrageous luck that I was born here," she says and leaves the ice on her left eye compared to rest. "I love this country, our animals, the wine that we ourselves grow." Fruits, olive oil, sausage, honey or jam - in the case of Mamma Maria follows the concept of agrotourism simple rules: everything on the table, even bred, reared, made - and so overwhelmingly delicious that you prefer the whole day only would eat.

Already with their first astonished the hostess snack: It ranges even anise-baked bread and a kind of apple panettone. Both looks unspectacular, but is exceptionally tasty. There is a shimmering glass of reddish liqueur, which I am skeptical of the cost, but am completely confused: An aroma armada, my taste buds gestürmt - Nelke front is followed by a laurel and citrus notes that I can not identify partout.

The heavy sweetness burns so much that it is tilted, the miracle drink only in homeopathic doses to enjoy - unless you have the constitution of Giuseppe, the cheerful glass after another drink, and be satisfied with both hands on the belly knocks.

Already, I am captivated by the city and its delights. Here everything goes its course and is a sublime way of course. The limbs are sluggish and sleepy, but Maria and her husband Salvatore have no time for leisure: "Mangiai, mo u vaju fatigue," is the name of a Calabrian proverb - "I've eaten, now I go to work."

Clack and crash into eerie depth

After hens, dog, rabbit, goats and pigs fed and the house has put in order, Maria decides to send me to show the area. We run through the karst landscape and sunny looking for peonies, which here in large numbers and flourish for centuries as a cure for gout, epilepsy, children's and women's diseases.

ON THE INTERNET

Relax in the country: Acampora Agriturismo in Calabria

Pollino National Park in Calabria

Santa Sanctuary Madonna delle Armi in Calabria

blogs ONLINE is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Maria pushes me velvet, farnähnliche a leaf yarrow in hand. Nothing special, you should think, but when I find it between his fingers grinding, spread it a beguiling scent of parsley, rosemary and bergamot. Even Achilles, in the Trojan war hemostatic effect of the herb have used - even today many Calabrian swear to his healing power.

In a grove rests Mary on a rock, and indicates an inconspicuous opening in the thicket. "Throw a stone purely times," she says. I'm looking for a brotlaibgroßen chunks and throw it into the hole. But instead of a muffled crash is a vastly clack and crash to hear incessantly dancing with the stone walls of the cave, until he barely 700 meters in depth to rest.

We are on the "abisso del Bifurto," also a "wolf cave" called karst cave near Cerchiara di Calabria. Already in the 10th Century monks lived here, and later studied predator and pastoralists in the abyss refuge. Today dare only tourists and well-equipped cavers not easy descent into the underworld.

Life in the karst landscape has shaped Maria: "I make perfume or chocolates with no joy, I do prefer stones gift," she says smiling, while a huge chunk admired by the wayside. "Looks like a foot, or?" Would prefer the 60-year-old monster, the same take, but common sense and the pain in the knee to keep the upper hand.

Drama about the stolen Madonna

A bit of wellness for the afflicted limbs would not be bad, but the nearby thermal pool of the nymph grotto only opens its doors in June. Already in antiquity the Sybariten bathed in a bubbling, sulphurous springs and enjoyed the shade and scattered sunlight, the interior cave diving in milky light. Today, a modern bath and Spa established.

We take a look into the sanctuary of Santa Maria delle Armi ", a lavishly restored sanctuary, which is about ten kilometers from Cerchiara away to the slopes of Mount Sellaro hugs. In the elaborately decorated Mamorkapelle stands at the heart of the former monastery: the black stone engraved portrait of the Madonna delle Armi. Many miraculous cures and Marian apparitions will be here over the centuries have given the belief in the Madonna is still unbroken.

As the thieves on the evening of the 6th May 1977 at the Sacred Stone is pulled, there was bewilderment among the faithful: "You have given us the Madonna delle Armi stolen, we are now motherless," it was in a folk song. "Let us not in the lurch," prayed the town, "because without you we can not be." And lo and behold: Only a day later Carabinieri discovered the relic in the fields of Sibari, where the robbers had hidden them. The world was back in order.

ON TO ONLINE blogs

Cultural city of Lecce: Stop Folklore! (13.05.2009)

Dumplings after Dolomite type of cuisine Ladiner (12.05.2009)

Fascination Gargano wonders between heaven and Earth (08.05.2009)

Diving in Liguria: In the sanctuary of the whales (05.05.2009)

Stromboli: Uphill to Purgatory (04.05.2009)

Italy Quiz: Do you belong to Tuscany Group?

Eng rooted in the Albanian culture is the soul-1000-Civita place. From here we descend down to the Roman "Devil's Bridge" in the shadow of the mighty "Timpe" spectacularly steep rising cliffs, looks like a tiny toy model. Heaps rises the red desert rock wall across the river Raganello, its icy cold waters in summer canyoning groups wade to the gorge close-up. Also rafting and hang gliding is offered here - the dramatic perspectives are sometimes staggering.

After so much fresh air and mountain scenery, exciting longs of "agrotourism" after only one: that Mary finally disappears into the kitchen to prepare their delicacies. Farewell is personally gezwirbelte Raschiatelli pasta with tomatoes and ricotta. I eat so much that hardly any room for the main course - a discreetly seasoned, salt-rich but very meaningful organic lamb, which I would love a few weeks. As a supplement, there are scrambled eggs with fried potatoes and fresh peas.

By sitting at the table Salvatore Maria's husband, a thoughtful man with sharp creases around the mouth. He cares for nature, his heart: "Many Calabrian destroy their environment because they are ignorant," he laments. Only in summer 2007, arsonists had 2000 hectares of pine forests were destroyed. "One should not always just think of the profit, but also the friendship," says Salvatore. "People like to take is to go to school - you always learn something new."

I would like to learn how Maria prepared her delicious tarts. Oranges, figs, almonds and fragrant roses after jam, I acknowledge, but there was still something else inside. Mary just smiles and gives wine.