Carol and Roger headed for southern Italy for only the second time. Back in 2014, they had cycled Italy’s southern coast and visited a castle built by Hannibal…(https://l-avventuragrande.blogspot.com/2014/05/hannibals-fortress.html)
That was 2,200 years ago…when Hannibal took his army, elephants and all, over the Alps to invade the Roman Empire. This castle was a feint to split the Roman’s defenses.
The local auto club noted there were 114 other castles worth visiting in the south…far too many to see them all. Nonetheless, their trip got off to a good start.
Their first stop was just south of the Amalfi Coast, at an albergo called Villa Le Favole.
Corrina, the proprietor of the hotel, recommended they visit Castello Di Arechi, perched high atop a hill overlooking the city of Salerno
High on a hill it certainly was, perched 1,000 feet above the heart of the city.
It was built shortly after the fall of the Roman Empire, designed by Byzantine solders, then updated by the Lombards, the Normans, and finally…in the 13th century…a French Anjou king.
It’s a fascinating place to walk around…
…if you don’t get vertigo looking over the precipice.
The prettiest castle they saw is called Castello Battipaglia, located just west of Eboli.
The Visit…
The reason Carol and Roger were headed to southern Italy was to visit the parents of their friend, Lorenzo Iovino, a researcher at Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
Lorenzo’s parents, Francesco Iovino and Rosa Moretti, were wonderful hosts…taking Carol and Roger to see parts of Calabria they had missed back in 2014.
With their guidance, the tour of the castles continued.
First stop: Castello di Roseto, about an hour’s drive from their home.
Built in the 10th century, the castle was meant to guard the Ionian Sea from encroachment by the Byzantine Empire. It was built in the shape of a trapezoid to duplicate the footprint of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
From there, they headed a few miles up the coast and inland to a town called Rocca Imperiale.
When Frederick II became the Holy Roman Emperor in 1220, he decided he needed a fortress to protect the place where the Appenine mountains met the Ionian Sea.
He built the appropriately-named Rocca Imperiale atop this hill. The town grew up around it.
We arrived at the castle just as the sun was setting and the gates were closing.
The entrance to the castle lies at the top of an impossibly narrow street, where Francesco had to turn his car around in a space only inches wider than the car would fit. It turned out to be a masterful 16-point turn.
The next day, the castle tour continued. Francesco and Rosa took Carol and Roger to the Swabian Castle in their home town of Cosenza.
Unfortunately, the weather was so bad we couldn’t see the castle through the fog and rain, so we had to use this photo supplied by the auto club.
The visit to Cosenza done, we headed to Matera, where…predictably…another castle dominated the top of the city’s highest hill.
It’s called Castello Tramontano…named after the local count…who in 1501 was granted permission to build it by the King of Naples.
However, not everyone gets to live in a castle. In our next post, we’ll show you where most of Matera’s residents used to live…
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