Casa Verde Blog

On a very warm and exciting, brilliant spring day we went up the Garfagna with some friends and celebrated the arrival of the season with a wonderful picnic.  We sat on top of a grassy hillside overlooking the magnificent Massa Carrara mountains still displaying silver shreds of winter snow.

It is the season for planting, putting flowers into pots to cover the terracing, digging beds to receive new young plants such as tomotoes, and the fields and campi are all covered in buttercups.  All along the sides of the roads there are wild displays of yellow, blue and white.

On the way to the picnic we stopped for a coffee in one of my favourite places; Bagni di Lucca, an old and once fashionable spa town that was home to one of Europe’s first casinos (now the local tourist office).  The building that housed the casino has a fabulous regency period ballroom.  It was here in the early 19th century that Napolean held his summer court as a guest of his sister Elisa Baciocchi.

The thermal springs here had attracted visitors from many centuries to the town but it’s fame on the Grand Tour faded and it is only in recent years that a lot of restoration work has taken place.  This quaint town is definately worth a visit and is about an hours drive from Vellano, with an especially scenic drive over the hills.  Bagni di Lucca is where our two cats Alfie and Caramella were born, so cheers to that!