Astigiano Paleontological Park | Shells, flowers and woodland creatures

The itinerary winds through the hills of Vinchio and into the small, wooded "Valley of Death." The toponym should not frighten: it would in fact derive from the bloody battle that, according to tradition, was fought in the valley around 935 and led to the defeat of the Saracen invaders.

The Valle della Morte loop is well-marked (with white laminated signs in accordance with Cai-Region standards), easily traversed and very interesting: you walk on a path through the dense, picturesque forests of the valley floor and on paved ridge roads, touching the Ulysses hut and an equipped paleontological outcrop, which allows you to observe many fossil shells up close (without touching them!).

The valley, entirely covered with dense woods, represents well the "green sea" with which partisan writer Davide Lajolo described the green undulations of the hills of Vinchio, where he was born in 1912.

The undergrowth is crowded with shrubs: hawthorn, dog rose, honeysuckle, wild blackthorn, sagebrush. The most common flowers are dogtooth, lungwort, primrose, anemone, lily of the valley, violet, cornflower, cuckoo flower, Solomon's seal, hepatica, cephalantha, and purple orchid.

The forest is inhabited by weasels, badgers, wild boars, squirrels, dormice, voles, hares, foxes, and hedgehogs. Among reptiles, the green lizard, great lizard and field lizard are common .

Green woodpeckers, lesser spotted woodpeckers, hoopoes, titmice, jays, magpies and some birds of prey: buzzards, kestrels, tawny owls; the colorful bee-eater, which digs burrows in the ground instead of building nests in trees, is also present.

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