Pescosolido Summer Camp, Abruzzo National Park July 2008

So I’m still updating with posts about my travels this summer…. after visiting my friends in Perugia, I headed to the Abruzzo National Park for the 2008 Pescosolido Summer Camp, hosted by a great guy Antonello Siragusa, who runs the Italy Farm Stay agriturismo and Eco Village projects in the area just outside Pescosolido, a short drive from Sora. The next five or so days were amazing!! The mission of this meeting is to “celebrate the beauty of life and nature”…… I had never heard of a summer camp like this one before, I learned that they hold them in different countries at different times, a lot of the people who came found out from the Couchsurfing website – which if you haven’t checked out….you should! It’s an amazing community of people all across the world who offer their places to travelers, or just meet up to chat and grab a drink with people travelling…it’s a great resource for meeting really great people all around the world to host you while you travel. All the people I met at this camp were amazing! Just really beautiful souls…with interesting stories and things to share.

Anyway, for the first few days we stayed at Antonello’s Eco Village and then moved to the meadow of Pescosolido to camp out, spend time together, hike, be in nature, sing around the campfire, and just basically live and experience this little piece of beauty and nature. I took numerous trips to the other farm nearby, the agriturismo nearby, which Antonello runs with his parents. What a beautiful place!! I was all set up to come back in September and volunteer for a month…and then I hurt my foot! So that obviously didn’t happen, but I’m truly hoping to go back and stay and work there sometime soon. Antonello’s father Giuseppe showed us around the farm and stuffed us full of their wonderful organic fruit and their delicious homemade wine, and told us all about the agriturismo, his life….what a great soul! He was so deeply passionate about sharing these stories with us, and I was so touched to be there and experience that.

I was also able to go on a 2 hour horseback ride to transport some horses, meet the beautiful farm animals, go on a hike to a freezing waterfall, sleep under the stars, cook amazing meals outside as a group, practice yoga out in nature, go to a local festival with live music and dancing, and just spend a few days with some great people. And the whole thing is free! Wow. It is a beautiful memory that I have and I do hope to go to more of these meetings in the future! And the area of the Abruzzo National Park is so beautiful, words just fail me in describing this magical place…

Here are some links about these different projects….check them out!! And then below are some pictures from this beautiful experience…enjoy!

Italy Farm Stay http://www.italyfarmstay.com/
Eco Village http://www.italyecovillage.com/
Pescosolido Summer Camp http://romesummercamp.ilbello.com/
Couchsurfing http://www.couchsurfing.com/