Hiking at Parco Delle Cascate

Ciao! If you are looking to get outside there is a wonderful "waterfall park" near lake Garda. It is in the beautiful little mountain village of Molina and it takes a little over an hour to get there from Vicenza. We tried putting "Molina" in our GPS and it did not come up. So we put the nearby town of Manune and then followed the signs to Molina from there.

Once you get in to Molina there will be signs for parking. The parking is free (as far as I could tell). Then you get out and walk, following the signs for "Parco Delle Cascate". BE WARNED, it is a LONG walk down to the park. And when I say down, I mean downhill which means you will have to walk back UP to get back to your car. It probably took us a good 20 minutes to get from our car the the park entrance and a little longer to get back UP the hill. I would recommend bringing a child carrier if you are bringing little ones, not a stroller. ALSO, before you walk down that big hill be sure you have 5 Euro for each person in your group that is over the age of six (there is a 50 cent Military discount which they did honor for us, but you never know). They do not take credit card. Maybe bring a little extra Euro to buy some yummy cherries in town too, they grow lot's of them in this area.

Once you get down to the park there are three "routes" you can take. They will give you a map so you will know. There is a half hour hike, an hour and a two hour. We did the hour one and with a little guy walking and lot's of stops it probably took us three hours. But the waterfalls are beautiful, the foliage is thick and provides lot's of shade and there are two waterfalls with swings over them that are lot's of fun.

My personal favorite waterfall was the "Doppio Covollo" or double hole. It was a little different then the others but very pretty and there were lot's of little newts and bugs in the water which my son LOVED.

Their website: http://www.parcodellecascate.it/eng_il-parco.php
Hours and prices: http://www.parcodellecascate.it/eng_prezzi.php
Their address is at the bottom of their webpage.

It's a bee, it's a hummingbird....no it's a moth!

We were out enjoying the lovely weather that Italy has been experiencing this week when we saw something strange. I swore it was a large bee. My husband swore it was a very small hummingbird. Upon returning home and researching the world's smallest hummingbird I found that they only live in Cuba. After a little more google time I found this:

It's a Hummingbird hawk moth. Apparently they are very common in Italy and they have come into Europe from Africa. Who knew? Anyone else seen one?