Parco Fluviale del Nera: Itineraries: Arrone

Arrone - Tripozzo

Trail Conditions: On foot

Departure: Arrone
Arrival: Tripozzo
Duration: 45 minutes
Difficulty Level: T - Tourist (level)
Length: 3.4 km

The oil route from the ancient Roman mills to today's mills
This itinerary has a great historic, anthropologic and landscape value; it starts from the inhabited centre of Arrone and, rising steeply at first, reaches an intensely cultivated olive area. The trail was once used as a connection (obviously on foot or mules) between the town of Arrone, an old knoll castle, and the town of Tripozzo. From locality La Valle the route climbs the slopes of Mount Tripozzo among the most beautiful olive groves of the area, with several panoramic viewpoints, up to the Spring of San Lorenzo (485 m. amsl). The itinerary retraces a route of great importance, under the anthropologic point of view, specifically due to the strong presence in this area of the traditions linked to olive cultivation. Not far from the spring there are the remains of a very ancient mill, certainly one of the most interesting elements of the itinerary, whose dating certainly goes back to the Roman era. Such presence not only constitutes by itself an element of great historic relevance, but also reconfirms the importance, already in ancient times, of anthropic activities connected to a cultivation so typically Mediterranean as the olive one. From the spring the trail continues to the small rural hamlet of Tripozzo (581 m. amsl), an interesting town, yet in recent years strongly penalized, like all the inhabited centres at a high altitude, by a severe process of demographic impoverishment. The centre, fraction of the municipality of Arrone, is located halfway up the western slopes of Mount Tripozzo and overlooks the Valnerina, opposite of Montefranco; almost abandoned in the post-war years, this town has been partially renovated and there is an agrotourism. From Tripozzo, proceeding along the trail, you can reach "lu Spiazzu" (625 m. amsl), where there are the remains of the cableway of the former lignite mine.