GTL - Grande Traversata delle Langhe - Stage 1: Castino

Highlights and tour details

A route along the crest to discover a past that speaks of towers, castles and defensive fortresses. Today, we admire the man-made terraces and walk alongside hazelnut groves that offers one of the sweetest fruits of these highlands.

Departure point of the route is the village of Castino, a fundamental crossroads, not only geographical or road-related, but also, and perhaps more so, ethnographic and cultural. Here, the Langa of wine makes way for that of hazelnuts, as the poetic atmospheres of Cesare Pavese bare themselves in the stark realism of Beppe Fenoglio. Here, brick definitvely gives way to stone and the farms become smaller, the houses low and miserable, the villages tiny. Life here has remained tenaciously attached to a few days of land, like the ivy remains embraced to the terraces erected to be able to cultivate it.

From the main square of the village, close to the fountain, you travel the short ramp of via Negro, then take via San Rocco. At the next junction, climb to the right until the end of the paved road and, on one of the last sections of cobbled street, you quickly reach the panoramic crest of the hill. Follow it among the croplands, on a trail, to a paved road; go left and, keeping on the crest, follow it to go passed the isolated house called “Cà Rossa”. At the next junction, you have to turn left, on the flat gravel road that enters the wood. At the first obvious fork in the road keep left, skirting the top of Bric Castel Martino. Here, right on the peak, once stood the homonymous fort of which some remains can be found, a few metres away, immersed in the wood. A little further on, another tower dominated the Bric Cisterna ensuring complete control of the road. In fact, this was the main road for Cortemilia, until the construction of the Napoleonic road (namely the current one, realised for obvious military requirements) and this is the oldest and the most travelled through the centuries, already of probable Roman use. A road which, not by chance, on one side descends to Cortemilia, arriving right at the castle and the nearby Franciscan convent, while on the other it descended straight (the section is now missing parts) for the convent of San Martino. Then, crossed the Belbo, it reached that of the Grazie, to climb back up to San Bovo, and from there, always in a straight line, it arrived to Alba. After Castel Martino, you find paved road once again and, on a few bends, you reach the church dedicated to San Martino. Follow the paved road that, descending quickly among the terraces, heads down towards the imposing ruins of the castle of Cortemilia.

The fortress of the Marquises Del Carretto of Cortemilia is still one of the most imposing and vast fortifications of the Langhe. If the Palacium has been lost, the imposing walls and the beautiful cylindrical tower of six floors, of beautiful workmanship, today chipped, remain standing. Here, they received the messages of the five surrounding “castles” (probably simple watch towers like those of Perletto, Bergolo, Gorrino and the two previously mentioned), placed to defend and watch over the valley floor, crossroads of rivers, trade, pilgrims and, inevitably, armies. The military and widespread control of the territory exercised by the Del Carretto family for centuries emerged in all its strategic importance with the Italian Campaign of Napoleon that found himself fighting and conquering these very fortresses one by one.

However, artillery did not exist in the Middle Ages and these castles were, therefore, truly impossible to take over. You skirt the walls of the castle and, having reached a bend, you abandon the paved road to continue straight on a cobbled lane, between the dry stone walls. You return to the paved road, now on the valley floor, close to the former convent of San Francesco. Turn right and passing the town hall, pass over the bridge of the Bormida that divides the two historical villages of San Pantaleo (beyond Bormida) and San Michele (on this side of the Bormida).

Attractions

Cortemilia: Ecomuseum of Terraces and Vine , Church of Santa Maria della Pieve , Fortified Complex.

Access

By car: A6 – Torino Savona, exit Marene or Carmagnola A21 – Torino Piacenza, exit Asti Est A33 – Asti Cuneo, exit Alba By plane: Milano Malpensa and Linate – www.sea-aeroportimilano.it Torino Caselle – www.aeroportoditorino.it Cuneo Levaldigi – www.aeroporto.cuneo.it By train: State Railways: www.trenitalia.com

Other information

Source: Unione Montana Alta Langa
Itinerary code: GTL
Recommended period: Apr - Nov
Historical interest: Yes
Access by public transport: Yes
Classification: Medium and low mountain provincial
Provinces crossed: Langhe Monferrato e Roero

Departure, arrival and municipalities crossed

Departure

Via Perletto, 29
Castino
12050 Castino (CN)
Cuneo

see on map

Arrival

Corso Teatro, 60
Cortemilia
12074 Cortemilia (CN)
Cuneo

see on map

Links

http://www.langheroero.it/

Stages

Please note that the routes may include some sections where there is traffic.

The information contained in the pathways is not binding on the authors and verifiers of the pathways.

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Hiking