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Only a few kilometres north of Florence you find yourself in the beautiful nature of the Mugello. Here you are in Apennine country, ridges grown over with chestnut and oak woods relieved by valleys covered with sunflowers or wheat. Rivers crossing the country, hills with cypress or olive trees and everywhere old buildings, fortresses, castles, villas and palazzos, many of them left behind by the once famous and powerful Medici family.

You can take the old "Faentina" railway from Florence straight into the heart of the Mugello. If you are by car you take the A1 motorway until the exit of Barberino di Mugello or the more colourful state road 65, the "Via Bolognese", until the village of Pratolino. (app.15 km.)

This area has a long tradition of hospitality and gastronomy, going back to the middle ages. Each town or hamlet in this region had their own markets for the sale of local agricultural and artisan products. The arised trade created a lot of travelling between different towns and so "Albergatori" hotels were opened to offer overnight hospitality to both travellers and their animals. The travellers could make use of the tables and order wine and food, both sober and substantial, as was common in this region.

Soon after the first "Osterie" opened, an inn offering similar services, but more modest and the "Taverne", (which we call the same) an establishment providing food and wine, but without further accommodation. These were all run with strict regulations concerning not only the different categories, but also on how to treat the clients.

For example, in contradiction of what we aspect, it was against the regulations to place tables outside in the street and "at a distance beyond two feet from the entrance" it was forbidden to promote "in a loudly way" your products to others than those passers-by needing accommodation. We can be happy, a lot has changed since than and nowadays we can enjoy our meal outside.

The Mugello cuisine is, what we call, a slow food cuisine, made with natural flavours. It consists of simple dishes made from genuine local ingredients: fresh vegetables, only a few spices like pepper and nutmeg, with the occasional addition of chilli, here known as 'zenzero'. Chestnuts, corn meal, game, peaches and pears also are commonly used. Lovers of healthy, simple and tasty food should go to this part of Tuscany.

Now it is the season of boiled and roasted chestnuts, dishes with game, like birds, stewed hare, wild-boar and deer; they all are extremely tasty and skilfully cooked, often in combination with different types of mushrooms. Soon the holidays start with feasts where roast ribs of pork are eaten together with dishes flavoured with truffles. This is also the season of Crostoni di cavolo nero, toasted bread served with boiled black cabbage and all kind of recipes using green cabbage, which has become more tender and tasty after the first frosts.

At Christmas the cooks at home and in the restaurants are busy preparing fancy meals; finely-rolled out dough for the "cappelletti" (stuffed pasta), pickled onions, mushrooms, toasted bread with chicken liver, capons, roast pork with potatoes and mixed grills. For sweets they make crunchy almond biscuits; "cantuccini" and served with a sweet wine; Vino Santo. The meal will be finished with an espresso and a glass of "Gemma d'Abeto" a liqueur made from pine resin by the monks of Monte Senario from an old recipe left by Father Martini, who was born in Sant'Agata del Mugello.

To enjoy all these delicacies, you need to have a good appetite and what makes a good appetite? Of course,a good long walk! Mugello has a lot to offer in this field. The turbulent geological history has given its landscape the "softness" of the Tuscan hills in combination with the severity of the steep passes, the gorges and the rocks of the Apennines.

You can expect to see the most beautiful views along the trekking ring which crosses the Mugello ridges and the Sieve Valley hills. Florence springs trekking (SO.F.T.) is a network of trails lay out to form one central ring from which twenty-two secondary rings branch off. The main ring follows a stretch of the Apennine ridge (Passo della Futa-Monte Falterona which coincides with the great Apennine trail (Gea). The twenty-two secondary rings are short daily tracks and each one stresses a particular natural, environmental or art-historical theme. Some of the rings actually retrace ancient road systems from the Etruscan-Roman and Medieval period. You pass castles, old churches, archaeological remains and beautiful Medici villas. The lover of nature will enjoy the rich and divers flora and fauna. Often you cross the tracks of wild boar, wild sheep and deer, sightings of them is common.

In the spring and summer the lovers of water find their way in the Mugello. At Lake Bilancio the canoeist, yachtsman, windsurfer and fisher can find everything he needs for exercising his sport. 10 million years ago, the compressing thrusts of the continents formed a huge basin into which the many different watercourses with no other outlet flowed forming a lake. The basin extended for about 300 square kilometres: from the Calvana Mountains to the Vicchio valley wall. Over millions of years sediments carried along by new streams and rivers replaced the lake by fertile land. Nowadays the valley holds again a great quantity of water. It holds 69 million cubic metres of water, 31 metres deep in its deepest point and covers an area of 5 square kilometres and was created to solve the problems of the Florence area hydro system (both possible flooding and drought).

Lake Bilancino is just a few minutes from the Barberino exit of the highway. On the northeast banks of Lake Bilancino, near the town of Galliano in Barberino di Mugello, you can find the Gabbianello Oasis. The Oasis is a natural habitat created for the preservation of different flora and fauna, which are most at risk of extinction in Italy and Europe. The World Wildlife Fund manages this magnificent environment with its forests, meadows and organically cultivated lands, which cover an area of 25 hectares. Eight of these hectares are covered in water, on level ground near the lake, offering rest and shlter during migration to numerous birds, like the white stork, crane, wild goose, black winged stilt, bittern, flamingo and the osprey It is possible for devoted birdwatchers to observe the birds from the four different observatories using the instruments provided by the Oasis. The facilities have been adapted to give access to wheelchair users.

For more information visit

• Comune Mugello