I have decided to speak about my birth-place because, although I’ll leave it for the next future, I love it nature, it landscapes. I’m perfectly convinced that, if I return in some years, I won’t lose the capability of astonishing of these places and that there is a link between a fellow and his native country. Have a look hereabouts: you are in ome of the most variegated places in Italy, the headland of Gargano. If you want, you may go the seaside, and have a stroll in the behind pine-wood; if it is warm, you can go and see wild animals in Foresta Umbra.

Geologically Gargano is a bit different from the rest of Apulia: anciently it was an island in the northern-part of Dalmazia. For this reason it presents the same karst phenomena of that area. Therefore it is diffucult to find remarkable rivers or lakes. Notwithstanding, there is a place, in the eastern part of San Giovanni Rotondo, known as Pantano di Sant’Egidio, which often is filled up with water. What remains of an ancient lake is a lake-bed. In the 19th century my ancestors removed a plug made of shingles and, from that time forward, water went directly in the aquifer and the lake was emptied out. Also that area was drained and the wood was substituted with plantations of almonds, walnut-trees and greens. In spring it is indeed an explosion of colors: ruddy poppies, yellow daffodils, wonderful butterflies.

In the northern part of the mountains that surround S.G.R. there is a very different landscape: expanses of glasslands which in winter are green, in summer dark-yellow; hither and thither oak woods and chestnut-groves; large tanks and long wall made of stones; a lot of dolinas. If one should say that it is a dingy, bleak or dismal landscape, I wouldn’t agree with him: nowadays it’s rather difficult to find so undefiled places.

One of the reason why the National Park of Gargano was instituted is the presence of lacustrine areas. In the northern part of Gargano there are two large lakes: Lago di Lesina and Lago di Varano. As attested by Plinio il Vecchio, they, more than 1000 years ago, were marine golfs; with building-up of detriti, which the rivers had carried for centuries, a narrow sand-bank formed. In this strip of sand there is the typical Maditerrean vegetations: ferulas, low trees and bushes of, for instance, rosemary, bay, myrtle, oleander, live oak. In these areas, also, a lot of species of birds, like storks, stop over during their migrations.

Gargano has been - also - a pelgrimage destination from many centuries, since the 5th century. According to hagiographical tradition, the archangel Michele appeared to Lorenzo Majorano, the archbishop of Siponto, in 8th May 490; in the vision the angel order Majorano to consecrate a grotto to him. The divine figure still appeared to Giovanni Alfonso Puccinelli, in 1656. Longobards, who were enthusiastic believers, used to reach the grotto via an historical road, Via Sacra Longobardorum. Then, around the cave, a country, called Monte Sant’Angelo, was built. It’s 40 km far from here.

But it isn’t the unique place of cult in Gargano: we have a lot monasteries: the Abbazia di Pulsano, for istance, a built, located in a sheer drop, where the Mass is said (according to/in) Byzantine Rite; Santuario di San Matteo and Convento dei Cappuccini in San Giovanni Rotondo. In this convent, San Pio da Pietrelcina, a saint well-known all over the world, spent 50 years of his life. Here San Pio finally found peacefulness, after having been transfered to many convents. Also, the life of another saint, San Camillo de Lellis is linked to my country. In the 17th century he had to went to the monastery; when he was in Valle Dell’Inferno, a dismal valley in the eastern part of San Giovanni Rotondo, he decided to devote his life to attend the Lord. Hit with a divine light, he fall to the ground, broke down and cried and did penance. In this way San Giovanni Rotondo became an important stage for his life.