Ermicciolo-Abbadia San Salvatore

Itinerary Ermicciolo – Abbadia San Salvatore

This 13-kilometre route connects the Ermicciolo Spring, in Vivo d’Orcia, with the Mining Museum of Abbadia San Salvatore, two Amiata sites of significant historical and social importance. The starting point is the small church located in the middle of the forest of Vivo d’Orcia, from herebegins a fairly technical path that is really worth discovering because of the many points of interest you can find along the way. Pristine woods, the pleasure of walking in silence and above all the possibility of encountering majestic boulders, thousand-year-old children of very distant eruptions, such as the Sasso de’ Merchi where some engravings attest the boundary between the property of the Macchia Faggeta Company and that of the Conti Cervini of Vivo d’Orcia. Or the Sasso della Culla that you can find halfway and houses a sculpture by the local artist Giancarlo Baiocchi, called the “Tacco”. These and many others are stories from other eras that have come to us thanks to the ability of the people of this mountain to treasure the past and preserve all its elements. No less evocative are the springs that walkers have the opportunity to find along the way, such as Barbara Spring, near the First Refuge. The efforts of technical passages are largely rewarded by some viewpoints that, due to their beauty, leave you breathless, one of them being the point called “Pizzicatopi”. Here, climbing on a wooden platform that overlooks spectacularly the landscape to the south-east of the Amiata, you can reach, on clear days, the mountains of the Abruzzo Apennines. Since the first steps, beechwoods and chestnut groves frame this path that, finally, also offers the opportunity to discover original examples of industrial architecture, such as the important former mining site of Abbadia San Salvatore.