Unconventional Collio: a walk in the places associated with Casanova

Food Slow Tour

19 September 2018

Food Slow Tour

Unconventional Collio: a walk in the places associated with Casanova

We are in Spessa di Capriva, in the Collio (Goriziano) hills. The village is overlooked by its beautiful late 19th century castle and boasts an ancient winemaking tradition. Today, it is a small gem for elite tourism featuring food, wine and golf, in a refined and romantic atmosphere. But Spessa is much more than this: you do not necessarily need to be golfers or wine tourists to spend a day at the castle and its estates surrounding the resort. If you like Italian gardens, themed tours and vine-covered landscapes, then Spessa Castle is for you. This is why!

Would you ever have imagined that in this corner of the Collio area, now so renowned and popular, the famous Venetian adventurer Giacomo Casanova, a guest at the Castle in 1773, described spending the most boring and arduous two months of his life there? He was so dissatisfied there that several times he wanted to leave the place, which, at that time, had nothing to offer him except the company of poor Sgualda at night. If you want to discover why, you can read his memoirs or be guided by someone, amused and fascinated by his tales, who decided to devote a walk to him. In the company of a Nordic Walking group of Duino, you can learn interesting facts and curiosities about the seducer's autumn stay at Spessa Castle, as the guest of the arrogant and quarrelsome owner of the castle at that time, Count Luigi della Torre.

In the park, a walk is dedicated to the Venetian writer, comprising ten stops, taking visitors among gloriettes, balconies, statues and centuries-old trees. At each stop, they can read several passages from Casanova's work “Le mie Memorie” about his stay at Spessa Castle. They can enjoy the magnificent trees and refined atmosphere of its ornate elements, examining the characteristics and principles behind the Italian gardens and discovering interesting facts about some of the exotic plants typical of 19th century aristocratic gardens. In addition to the ten info boards, his memoirs include episodes that perfectly describe the reasons why his stay was one of the most boring and arduous of his life.

After the walk in the park, we set off along the dirt track in front of the castle and walked about four kilometres among farmhouses on the hills, vineyards, olive groves and golf courses, bordering on, for a short stretch, the very pretty and quiet rural village of Pradis, in the municipality of Cormons. Here, among the wild flowers and multi-coloured butterflies in flight, we walked along country roads off the marked tourist routes, where the pleasant scent of grapes lingers. The castle and its surroundings offer several scenic viewpoints. Now and again, we stopped for a while to read some of the unique and amusing episodes recounted by Casanova in his chapter about Spessa.

You can try and explore our region through the places described by writers: it will be like reading their works, but the difference is that you will not only read them with your eyes but also with all your senses and your imagination will give them a shape, a colour, a scent and perhaps even a pleasant sound.

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Sabrina Pellizon

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I began my experience in the inbound tourism world as a tour leader and gradually became a regional nature/environmental tour guide.

I began my experience in the inbound tourism world as a tour leader and gradually became a regional nature/environmental tour guide. I’m also involved in educational activities with donkeys and I love walking at the pace of Noè, my little adopted donkey and a companion in our explorations of my Preval. I adore informing and amazing our guests, pampering and accompanying them as I tell them all the curious and original things to know about our environs.