The best walks and hikes around Area Marina Protetta Secche della Meloria

Please take into account that it is very technical and some roads are closed.

A place of worship and perdition for an entire generation 🖤

We were early at the ferry and went to the old town to get something to eat. It's best to ask someone who already has food about the quality. There are "tourist traps" that serve mediocre food.

Piazza Belvedere, enclosed between two stretches of beautiful coastal pine forest (which still retains the original structure of a large beach with remains of dunes of very fine sand), is the center of seaside, commercial and recreational life in Tirrenia; it is very popular in summer, but retains its sweet and melancholic charm even in winter.

Giovanni Baratta came from a family of sculptors from Carrara. He was the son of Isidoro Baratta and nephew of Francesco Baratta the Elder (around 1595–1666) and Giovanni Maria Baratta (around 1627–1675). His brothers Francesco Baratta the Younger (1663–1729) and Pietro Baratta (1668–1729) were also sculptors. His nephew Giovanni Antonio Cybei (1706–1784) worked for him as an assistant and took over his uncle's studio after his death.

Chiesa di San Ferdinando, also called Chiesa della Crocetta. Church from the 18th century, marble decorations by Giovanni Baratta

Eremo della Sambuca (Valle Benedetta - Livorno) The hermitage is located south of the Valle Benedetta in the forest of the Livorno Mountains. Already known in the 13th century as an Augustinian hermitage, one of the many that flourished throughout the Christian West to welcome those who wanted to retreat in prayer far from the noise of the world, in 1390 it took the name of Eremo di Santa Maria in Parrana Among others, the Gesuati penitential friars settled there. The Gesuati (not to be confused with the Jesuits) were born as an association of lay penitents founded in the 14th century by St. Giovanni de' Colombini from Siena. They preached peace, poverty and their main function, in addition to prayer, was to assist the sick, the poor and the needy. They spread throughout Italy and, in particular in Tuscany, founded many convents. The Augustinian hermitage was expanded and strengthened by them with other interventions in the vicinity (cultivations, a water mill, "icehouses"). Precisely because of the holy life that these monks led and because of its position sunken into the valley of the Ugione stream, the hermitage took the name of Santa Buca, or Sambuca. Over time, the Gesuati also took over the administration of the Sanctuary of Montenero. After the Gesuati order was suppressed in 1668 by Pope Clement IX (and their assets confiscated to support the war against the Turks), the complex passed to a series of private owners and followed a long period of decline. The structure consisting of a small church (with a single nave, divided into three bays with a circular apse, cross vaults and remains of frescoes, including an Annunciation), cells, guesthouse, refectory, kitchen, granary, cellar, is in poor condition. Since 1950 the structure has been a state-owned building of the Municipality of Collesalvetti. In 1912 it was declared a national monument and a few years ago it was entrusted to the Parish of Giovanni Gualberto in Valle Benedetta.

Ancient Hermitage, whose oldest nucleus dates back to 1100 (small church of Santa Maria di Parrana, with a few cells, Augustinian Fathers of S. Jacopo in Acquaviva), located in the valley of the Ugione torrent, in the Provincial Natural Park of the Livornesi Mountains and in the complex regional agricultural-forestry Livornesi Hills (Valle Benedetta Forest). From 1390 the hermitage took the name of Santa Maria della Sambuca and the penitential Gesuati friars settled there (until 1668, the year of dissolution of the order), with consequent expansion of the structure (church, cells, guesthouse, refectory, kitchen, barn, cellar). A state property since 1950, the Hermitage has been partly renovated with CIPE funds, but is in a state of abandonment and the other two wings (including the beautiful cloister) require urgent conservative restoration. Of great interest for the circuit of existing routes that touch other cultural emergencies such as the remains of mills on the Ugione stream (late 1600s - early 1700s), the ice houses (late 1700s) and other historical-cultural testimonies, as well as naturalistic and geological emergencies.