Viterbo and Surroundings
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The city of Viterbo is situated in "Alto Lazio", capital of the homonym province, usually called Tuscia. Known worldwide as the City of Popes, is located at the center of the province, close to the Cimini Mountains between Lake of Vico and Bolsena. Just outside the city center of Viterbo there are the famous Thermal Baths of the Popes and the spring of "Bullicame", mentioned in canto XIV in Dante's Inferno, which feeds the big swimming pool of the "Terme dei Papi" and various other "pools". Other springs in the nearby, all belonging to the basin of the "Bullicame" flow other "pools" scattered in the surrounding countryside. |
| About 2.5 Km far from the city, in the small village of Bagnaia, is found the beautiful Villa Lante with its park and gardens of the Renaissance. In the immediate vicinity of the town there is the Etruscan necropolis of Castel d'Asso and only nine kilometers far the ruins of the "civitas splendidissima" of Ferento with its Roman theatre. The Monster's Park (Parco dei Mostri) or "Sacro Bosco" of Bomarzo is a monumental garden, built by the eccentric Earl Vicino Orsini, where you'll find at the inside gigantic monuments and sculptures depicting monstrous animals and mythological figures. |
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| Going on with the trip, we get to Civita di Bagnoregio, located in remote position, only reachable through a pedestrian bridge in reinforced concrete. Which because of its isolation and the gradual erosion of the hill and the surrounding valley, which has given rise to the typical forms of the gullies and that continues today, threatening to make her disappear for ever, for this is also called "the country or city who dies". Not far from Civita there is Orvieto, the city who shares with Bolsena the sacredness of the Eucharistic miracle of Corpus Domini (this is the place where the vestments and the evidence of the miracle of Bolsena are kept). |
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Bolsena is the Miracle's city happened in 1263 in the basilica consecrated to the Saints George and Cristina. In 1264, has been instituted the "Corpus Domini" festivity. This festivity is celebrated with a procession and with the traditional "Infiorata" through the streets of Bolsena which are covered with floreal carpets. S. Cristina's festivity, christian martyr and patron saint of Bolsena, is equally important. Every year the evening of the 23th July and the morning of the 24th July, the S. Cristina's martyrdom are remembered through some living and plastic pictures called "Misteri". |
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From the Lake of Bolsena you can proceed toward Tuscania, well known for the romanesque churches of "Saint Peter" and "Santa Maria Maggiore" and the etruscan necropolis. From Tuscania you pass to Tarquinia valuable for the etruscan necropolis with painted tombs and the "Etruscan National Museum". After Tarquinia we find Vulci where you can visit the etruscan necropolis near the castle and the Abbadia's bridge. |
