The millennial interactions between Nature and Culture have moulded the patrimony of inestimabile value preserved by the National Park of Cilento, Vallo di Diano and Alburni: Greek towns and ancient historical centers, ancient abbeys, castles and hamlets are still harmoniously inserted in uncontaminated naturalistic contexts, rich of plants and rare animals, huge terraced olive trees fields, caves, caverns and large woods. The Park includes 80 Communes, and has a surface of 181.048 hectares of protected territory and is characterized by the alternation of scarcely inhabited natural areas and higly populated territories. Such peculiar heterogeneities represent the distinctive trait of the Protected area, inserted in the list of the World Patrimony of UNESCO in the category “cultural landscapes”, as exceptional example of the harmonic integration between the work of the man and the Mediterranean natural environment, from the middle Paleolithic to our days. It represents a classical example of second generation Park, living laboratory, where it is possible to experiment the opportunities of the sustainable tourism and to match the preservation of the natural patrimony with the promotion and the socioeconomic development of the territory. Within a range of few kilometers you can pass from the sea to the mountain, from the sea tastes to the typical dishes of the inland. A vacation in Cilento will let you enjoy many occasions of fun and knowledge. The coast has a typically Mediterranean aspect, with a sequence of inlets, small sandy beaches, steep walls and promontories dominated by the complex system of Norman-Aragonite defense and sighting towers, connected to the inner areas through fortresses and castles. Several medieval ridge and coastal installations, the guard an artistic patrimony of immense value, constituted by a myriad of basilican chapels and noble buildings. As the whole territory of the Protected area, also the archaeological sites of Paestum and Velia as the monumental splendor of the Chartreuse of Padula, are part of the prestigious list of the sites inserted by the UNESCO in the world Patrimony of humanity. The famous Paestum, founded by the Acheis Sibariti around the VII sec. B.C., let us admire the most beautiful and better preserved monuments of Magna Graecia. The Focesis founded Velia (VI century B.C.), hometown of the Eleatic school of Parmenide that has stimulated and illuminated the history of the western philosophy. St. Lawrence’s Chartreuse of Padula is a real jewel of the monastic architecture, main example of the Baroque art of southern Italy, counted among the international Monuments already in the far 1882. Among the main natural heights of the Park, the Cervati Mountain with its 1898 mt. is the tallest of Campania and represents, together with the zone of the Sacred Mountain or Gelbison, of the Alburni, of the Stella Mountain and the Bulgheria, the naturalistic heart of the Protected area. The calcareous nature of the Alburni, whose name derives from Albus, for the characteristic white coloration of the rocks, has originated several caves such as those of Castelcivita, inhabited since the Neolithic and those of Pertosa, that wind in a fascinating underground way of about 2000 meters.
THE PARK CILENTO, VALLO DI DIANO E ALBURNI
