The ethnographic hiking trail of Rio Caino
The Rio Caino trail is one of the most suggestive places in the entire Valle del Chiese. It is an open-air museum with a popular tradition, located near the village of Cimego, on the left side of the Chiese River. The route starts from a small suspension bridge over the river and is approximately 4 kilometers long. Follow the winding path up on a comfortable walk. Bring and benzoe to an extraordinary array of artisan settlements, such as still-functioning blacksmiths and mills, mortar ovens, trenches dating back to World War I, the lumberjack’s workshop and charcoal burner, and magical tales of witches and heresy. A museum where the walls are old beech and pine forests, the ceiling is the sky and the rest areas are wooden benches with beautiful views.
During the summer months there is the opportunity to witness the workings of the mill, the magic of firing and the transformation of iron by the blacksmith. All thanks to the power of water!
The trail can be visited all year round (with the exception of entering the factories outside the summer months). Discover the beauties that nature has to offer in every season!
The route takes approximately 3 hours; comfortable clothing and trekking shoes recommended; use of the pushchair is not recommended. Along the way there are fountains with drinking water and a refreshment point in the middle.
The Marascalchi house
The magic of the past continues at Casa Marascalchi, in the heart of the medieval village of Quartinago, a few minutes’ walk from the Rio Caino ethnographic trail. A real museum of peasant civilization, where you can rediscover the roots of the inhabitants of this Trentino valley. Once you cross the threshold, time seems to have stood still at precise moments: in the old kitchen, the kettle is still on the hearth, the plates on the table; the carpenter’s workbench is full of barely used items. Upstairs the bedrooms, with the nightgowns taken off and put on the bed, and some games scattered around the nursery. And then, in the attic, the straw mattress, fruit hanging to dry. Where are the inhabitants? Did they suddenly run away? Perhaps if you listen in silence, you can hear their voices …
The Casa Marascalchi farmer’s museum can be visited during the summer months on a guided tour. The duration of the visit is approximately 1 hour.
The parish of Condino
Born as a rural religious institution of late ancient origin, the Pieve settled at the time of the barbarian invasions and inherited the role of administrative, economic and political guide of the Alpine communities. After the year 1000 it was still included in the nascent congregational institutions, a situation for which the term thus referred to both the territory of that particular ecclesiastical district and the sacred building.
The parish church of S. Maria Assunta in Condino has an old Romanesque structure and in fact appears in historical documents from 1189. However, between 1495 and 1505 it was completely rebuilt in Late Gothic Renaissance style by order of Condino’s General Rule. on a project and under the direction of master mason Albertino Comanedi from Osteno (Como) and subsequently decorated by some thirty artists, mostly from Lombardy.
Murals
Built in a single nave divided into four bays, the parish church of Condino now has a magnificent main portal, built in the three-year period 1534-1536 in Renaissance style in local white stone by the sculptor Giovanni Lorenzo Sormani from Osteno (Como) and, along the interior walls , a series of murals created between 1504 and 1507 by “German and Brescian painters” (cit. Papaleoni), depicting figures of saints and Madonnas of exquisite craftsmanship, a scene with Saint George and the Dragon and an example of “Hortus Conclusus” , a special and rare symbolic representation of the Annunciation, more widespread on German soil. The final judgment is on the sacred arch instead.
Among the eight remarkable polychrome wooden altars placed on the side walls from the first half of the 16th century, the altar known as “della Scola”, made by the great master carver Stefano Lamberti in collaboration with painters such as the Piazza di Lodi and de Romanino, and that of S. Antonio Abate.
Also worth noting is the Ancona of the High Altar on the presbytery, sculpted and assembled between 1538 and 1545 by the famous Brescia sculptors Maffeo and Andrea Olivieri.
Since 1972, the Pieve di Condino has been listed as a monument of national importance. Its care was entrusted first to the Superintendency of Verona and then to the Autonomous Province of Trento.
