Location Spotlight: Unforgettable Landscapes of Liguria
20 Red Lights, production service in Italy, offers a peak at some beautiful locations.
Starting with Liguria, a region in Northern Italy, and following with the rest of the Bel Paese, 20 Red Lights will offer to foreign productions an idea for where in Europe to set their projects.
Liguria is an area rich in natural beauty where the combination of land and sea makes the variety of ecosystems present in its territory particularly heterogeneous. In fact, there is a national park, nine regional parks, three nature reserves and one national reserve. The east coasts are largely elevated, rocky and jagged, while to the west the coast softens, leaving room for sandy areas as well.
Liguria is a unique place, capable of enclosing in a few kilometres unforgettable landscapes, a stupendous sea full of life, seaside villages set on dramatic cliffs, beaches and coves, but also verdant valleys, stone villages, mountains covered in snow in winter but still overlooking the blue Mediterranean, Medieval historic centres full of history and charm, but also a modern city like Genova.
That is why more and more productions are choosing it as primary location over the usual Italian destinations, that have consolidated during the years as 'The Italian way of living'.
From The Wolf of Wall Street to Murder Mystery, only to quote the most famous ones, many film productions have set the 'luxurious location' in Portofino or Camogli. In the first film, we can see Jordan Belfort (Di Caprio) partying on his yacht in Portofino and, in the end, sinking the ship for sailing it to a storm while being on drugs. In the second film, Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler impersonate a regular married couple, who end up on a rich man's yacht on the Ligurian coast, and there meet a famous actress. However, the Liguria region is not only for rich people and big stars!
Many productions have set their stories in the ancient Ligurian fishing villages, like in The Bourne Identity, or in the tiny allies of the cities, telling about another Italy, lived by ordinary people just living their lives, but in the magical Southern European world.
Liguria has borders with Piedmont, Emilia-Romagna, Tuscany and France. The region is between the Ligurian Alps and the Ligurian Apennines to the north. Along the Levante coast there are several places known all over the world for their beauty, passing from Portofino to the Cinque Terre, the latter have been part of Unesco since 1997, to which the islands of Palmaria must also be added, Tino and Tinetto, as well as Portovenere. Thanks to the mild climate all year round, the region offers sports enthusiasts the opportunity to practice a large number of activities: trekking, mountain biking, sailing, golf and free climbing. For the latter sport, the stops are inevitable: Monte Muzzerone in the province of La Spezia, the Finalese area in the province of Savona and the Pennavaira valley, also in the province of Savona.
Genoa is the capital of Liguria. On the Gulf of Genoa in the Ligurian Sea, Genoa has historically been one of the most important ports on the Mediterranean. Genoa's historical city centre is known for its narrow lanes and streets that the locals call 'caruggi', and part of it was also inscribed on the World Heritage List (UNESCO) in 2006. Genoa is also famous because of its Aquarium. It is the largest aquarium in Italy, and the building, which some say looks like a ship ready to head out to sea, was designed by the Genoese architect Renzo Piano of the Renzo Piano Building Workshop. The aquarium includes 70 tanks containing a total of 6,000,000 litres (1,300,000 imp gal; 1,600,000 US gal), and almost 10,000 meters (33,000 ft) of exhibit space.
Portofino is an Italian fishing village and holiday resort famous for its picturesque harbour and historical association with celebrity and artistic visitors. The entire municipal territory is included in the Portofino Regional Natural Park and in the Portofino Marine Protected Natural Area. The best way to appreciate the wonders of the park is to safely walk its most characteristic and fascinating paths, all adequately marked. Crossing the dense network of over 60 km, it is possible to discover the richness and variety of the natural environments, panoramas and complex monuments of the promontory.
Only 5km from Portofino and 40 km from Genoa, the San Fruttuoso abbey is a corner of paradise you can reach only by ferry from Camogli and Rapallo or on foot. This one-time Benedictine monastery (Xth century), from the 13th century the abbey’s fate became intertwined with that of the Doria family, who renovated its design, adding the loggia and transferring here the family burial ground. The Abbey and the fishing village around it stand as a true oasis in a unique scenario, amid the earth and the woodlands of Mount Portofino and the blue sea of eastern Liguria.
The Cinque Terre National Park is a protected area inducted as Italy's first national park in 1999, it can be divided into two parts: the coastal area and the marine area. The five medieval towns along the Ligurian Coast provide scenic views of rugged terrain reeled in with terraced stone walls, where the mountains of Appennino Ligure come straight to the sea. The form and disposition of the towns as they embrace topography embedded in the cliffs are a testament to the long history of settlement and the terraced cultivated lands to the agricultural heritage of the area. The naturalistic heritage is rich and varied thanks to the orographic complexity of the territory. Among the initiatives and events organized by the Park, excursions, educational activities and events, such as the Cinque Terre Walking Park, meeting dedicated to ecotourism with thematic excursions in the company of expert tourist and environmental guides. 18 kilometers of rocky coast full of bays, beaches and deep sea beds, dominated by a chain of mountains that run parallel to the coast. Terraces planted with vines and olive trees, whose containment is ensured by ancient dry stone walls. A naturalistic heritage of great variety. Paths and mule tracks with breathtaking views.
Five villages, Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, Monterosso, overlooking the sea. An environment in which the centuries-old work of generations has transformed an inaccessible territory into a landscape of extraordinary beauty. A Marine Protected Area and a National Park that protect its absolute uniqueness. These, in short, the Cinque Terre, declared by UNESCO since 1997 a World Heritage Site.
Camogli is a fishing village and tourist resort located on the west side of the peninsula of Portofino, on the Golfo Paradiso in the Riviera di Levante, in the Metropolitan City of Genoa, Liguria, northern Italy. Among the civil architectures there is the small Castle of the Dragonara, built in medieval times to protect the village and the entire coast. Another defensive complex to see is the characteristic Punta Chiappa Battery, built between the 1930s and 1940s and used during World War II.
Lerici rises in the centre of a small natural inlet, called Seno di Lerici and dominated by a promontory on which the imposing castle stands out. The town is part of the Montemarcello-Magra-Vara Regional Natural Park. Lerici is also a strategic position to explore other wonders of the surroundings. Boat trips to Portovenere and the Cinque Terre or a ride to the worldly places of Tuscany. The castle that dominates the town of Lerici from the top of a rocky promontory was built by the Pisans in the mid-200s at the time of the maritime republics and the war with Genoa. The castle has spanned the centuries and today it preserves the external walls almost intact thanks to the recent restorations.
Liguria is the land of Vermentino, one of the most important Italian white wines. The cultivation of grapes in Liguria, like in few other places in Italy, is called heroic viticulture, due to the difficult weather conditions and the high slopes. As anyone would assume, each region in Italy has its own specialties in food and wine. In the case of Liguria, to accompany a good glass of Vermentino wine, you could have a slice of Focaccia, a type of flat bread made with flour, salt, yeast and olive oil; or maybe some Farinata, made of only chickpea flour, water, extra-virgin olive oil and rosemary. The real specialty is, however, the Pesto, a sauce for pasta made from basil, pine nuts and Parmesan cheese.
Liguria is a destination where there is a wide variety of choices both in terms of location and general feeling. Within a short distance you can have different landscapes and situations, from coastal cities rich and full of history, to snow-capped mountains with ski facilities, from fishing villages to yachts sailing between Portofino and Montecarlo, from wide landscapes full of vineyards to narrow lanes in the towns.
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