Calcata is an ancient hilltop village that is about 45 minutes from Soriano, near Rome. What makes this village so special is that in the 1930's, it was condemned, and became a ghost town. However, in the 60's hippies and artists began to squat here, and over time it developed into a thriving artist colony of sorts. There are currently about 60 local residents of the village, who have restored it over the years and opened restaurants, cafes, and art galleries.

The town swtill carries with it the vibe that set it on its current path. The art galleries are very non-traditional, the cafes serve mostly vegetarian fare, and the people are without question the modern version of the hippies of the 60's. In fact, the vive is very similar to that of Sedona, Arizona, except that it has an Italian flavor to it.

7 months, 17 tours, 56 cooking classes, 144 guests and over 35,000 miles of Tuscany, Umbria and Lazio are behind us.  That was the 2008 season for us at Culture Discovery.  As with last year, after coming back to the US, I have gone into video mode.  Here is the first video I have made since coming back, which essentially sums up the season:

What a wild ride it was.   It was a lot of fun, and a lot of work…. but always very rewarding.  Most of all, we made a ton of new friends and had the opportunity to share something we love with so many new people.

CultureDiscovery.com is a proud sponsor of this year's Jazz Festival in Soriano. We hope you will come and see us! We'll be filming a great deal of the festival this year in High Definition, as well as conducting numerous interviews.

This is the preliminary schedule for the 2008 Jazz festival in Soriano. Most performances begin around 9:00 PM in Soriano's main Piazza. Some performances will take place in the City Hall Courtyard. Keep in mind that more events are likely to be added to the schedule as time drawn near. Additionally, performances end at midnight as the Rotezzia Pub in Soriano (Located in Catacombs below the main Piazza) opens up for all-night Jam Sessions.

Ask around Soriano about ‘Fosso Mulino’ (River Mill) and you will get mostly blank stares. So it is no surprise that after all of these years I had no idea that it existed. Very few people do.

One day I was out with my friend (and our contractor) Andrea D’Alessio. He asked me if I had ever been to the waterfalls. My immediate answer was YES! There is a place in Soriano with some beautiful waterfalls that few know about, and I had been there. In fact, years ago I was telling Paola about them, and she didn’t believe me until I showed her.

Anyhow, Andrea didn’t believe that I had been to ‘The waterfalls’, so he asked me to describe them. As I did, he laughed and simply explained that there were other, more breathtaking, waterfalls in Soriano. So he took me. He explained that not only was this a beautiful fork of the Tiber with awesome waterfalls, but there were the ruins of a 13th century Olive Mill. Cool!

We drove just past the Viterbo-Orte Superstrada, right at the Soriano-Bomarzo exit, and hung a left. We drove down a road which is well known as a hangout for some extremely vile looking prostitutes (another story there) and parked along a little dirt road. After exiting the car, we went down a small trail into what appeared to be complete nothingness.

At one point, I noticed beneath my feet there was some ancient concrete road, which was ribbed. Andrea explained that this was the path the mules used to cart the olives down, and the oil up.

Next I found myself in a tunnel of sorts, created by massive rocks around me, and extending about 200 feet down the hill. All the while, this ancient road ran beneath my feet.
After exiting the tunnel, immediately to my right was the river. As I walked toward it, I was struck by an absolutely beautiful set of waterfalls as I saw the water that had literally carved its passage through this ancient volcanic rock over millions of years. To say it was stunning would be an understatement.

We walked around as I cursed my lack of a spare battery for my camera. It had a little juice left in it, so I took what video I could. How could I never have known about this place?
As we crossed back to our entry point, there was an old structure in ruin. Andrea told me to look to my feet. There, sitting in the middle of this little forest was an ancient olive mill wheel. We then entered the structure, and a few more wheels were just lying there haphazardly. Wow! What a great experience to see all of this in such an untouched state.

Such was my morning visit to what I now know of as ‘Fosso Mulino’. You won’t find it in any tour books, and you won’t find any ‘professional’ guides that can show it to you. It is just one of those hidden treasures, like Corviano, that you just have to be with the right person to see.

I’m pretty sure I will make this a tour stop with my groups that are into nature and hiking.

Things got quite busy since my last post. We had a wave of guests come to Soriano, and the annual chestnut festival ( Sagra delle Castagne ) began, which really kept me running, camera in hand.

The folks in Soriano's tourism office were kind enough to issue me an all-access press pass for all of the events, so I have tons of content (both video and photo) from the last few weeks that will take form in blog articles over the next few weeks.

So now that I am back in the US and getting over my jet lag, I'll begin...

I remember my mother telling me about her move to Southern California, and how excited she was the first time she picked an orange off a tree and ate it right there.  I was thinking, like... ok, big deal... you need to get out more!  But then again, she was from New York, and I had been born and raised in L.A.  After all, I had never seen an apple tree...  In fact, at 42 years, I still have never seen an apple tree.  Maybe I'm the one that needs to get out more.

That said, if you are reading this from Napa Valley (Hi Jac and Ami), this post might have you thinking I've been locked in a cage most of my life.  Well, that cage was walled by the confines of the 101, 405 and 118 freeways in the San Fernando Valley, and I can't stop saying to myself: ‘Dude!  I, like, fully made WINE yesterday'. 

I love Football (Go USC!) & Baseball (Go Dodgers!).. I'm an American after all.  But I have never been able to sink my heart into Soccer. So having spent all of these years in Italy, I've never been to a serious professional Soccer match.  I've been to the small ones, but never ‘Stadium Sized' games.  That changed yesterday.

I'll write this article aimed at people that are not up to speed in the world of European Soccer, so I ask those of you that are in the know to be patient with me.

For those of you that will be coming to Soriano for the Chestnut Festival, I thought I would post a video that shows a few of the highlights.  This video is a promotional piece by Soriano nel Cimino's Medieval Swordsmen.  While they perform at many festivals all over the world, being from Soriano, they perform at each and every festival in the town.

This video concentrates on them, but many of the video clips are taken during the Chestnut Festival (Sagra delle Castagne) over the years.   Enjoy!

40th Annual Chestnut Festival (Sagra delle Castagne) Schedule - 2007

Every year, during the first two weeks of October, Soriano nel Cimino hosts a festival that surrounds the chestnut harvest. This festival is done on a large scale, and attracts thousands of people from surrounding areas, including Rome. The two main events of the Sagra are the Palio and the Corteo Storico. Unfortunately, we don't know which days these will be held until shortly before the festival. That said, the schedule for 2007 has been released, so here it is:

For the first time, Soriano hosted the Tuscia in Jazz Festival.  This international festival had been held in nearby Ronciglione for the past five years, but apparently that town had complained about the noise and decided they didn’t want it anymore.  The festival promoter, Italo Leali, was faced with the chore of finding a new host last year.  According to Italo, he chose Soriano for several reasons:  It has very good access to Rome, Florence and Italy’s main freeway, it has enough restaurants and hotels to support such a large festival, it has the character and ambiance essential to such a festival, and it has appropriate venues (large piazza, etc) for such a festival.  For all intents and purposes, his reasons are in sync with my own reasons for promoting Soriano: Character, Beauty, Proximity and Infrastructure.

The festival was not at all what I had expected.  I honestly thought that it would be a cute little festival with a few nights of music, headed by some local Italian jazz musicians.  Instead, it turned out to be a major International event.