canyon exploring with Michele Angileri

Valle Petrinara

Of the many, deep valleys that furrow the green sides of the Reatini Mounts, only a few are interesting for canyoning. The cause is, as usual, karst: rainfalls, although abundant in this area, feed unknown underground water networks that end up in the great springs at the foot of the range. The deep valleys remain almost always dry, even fossil in some cases.
Yet even here some rare high-altitude springs give life to streams that jump through the deep valleys surrounded by woods.

I remember ...

The measures against the COVID-19 epidemic have had a heavy impact on all sectors of social and individual life, also severely hitting those sports and economic activities that promote health and well-being (and therefore strengthen the immune system).
The "walks" are one of such activities. I am referring to multi-stage hiking routes traced through rural or mountain areas that are becoming depopulated, routes that follow (at least in part) the ancient communication or pilgrimage ways, where the stops are in hostels, monasteries or small hotels outside main tourist circuits. The "walks" are a breath of fresh air for walkers, for those who host them, for the territories crossed ... But they too have ended up in the grinder of anti-COVID measures, distancing, travel bans, ...

The path that runs through Petrinara valley is one of the stages of the "Saint Benedict walk", which goes from Norcia to Montecassino, and the Poggio Bustone monastery is one of the places to stay overnight. A sign at the monastery door, however, warned that hospitality for walkers was suspended due to anti-covid measures. Therefore, I did not expect to meet walkers as I climbed the Valle Petrinara path towards the starting point of the gorge.
But instead I met them, a nice large group that came from Leonessa, intent on breathing pure air, struggling in the cool of the beech forest, quietly chatting.
And there were walkers down too, on the dirt roads of Poggio Bustone, on the paths to St. Francis hermitage ... small groups of families or friends walking on that splendid and not too hot June day.
This made me doubly happy: for myself, for what I was doing, and for all of them, for their great little recapture of a freedom so unjustly denied in the previous months.

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