The paradisiac Garden of Kolymbetra in the Valley of the Temples in Sicily

For having admired the majestic Greek temples of Agrigente, celebrated by the philosopher Empédocle and the Pindare poet, it is necessary to be armed with courage to discover the Garden of Kolymbetra.

One reaches that point while following the formidable wall built on the peak of the hill, until the end of the site.
At the origin, it was an immense basin of 5ha dug by the Carthaginian prisoners in order to be used as fish pond with fishes for the Greek city.

It was and is always fed, 2500 years after, by a small torrent bordered of reeds, willows, tamarisk, euphorbiums and palm trees dwarf.
The place was then transformed into orchard, becoming a garden of the delights.
According to the Arab culture, the “garden” represents at the same time the wealth of the fruits and the beauty of the luxuriance.

With 19th and 20th century, the Garden lives one period of great splendour, becoming one of the destinations of the Large Turn, travels of aristocratic education carried out by young people of the more upper classes of the company European and intended to perfect their education.

In 1980, the garden was given up for lack of water provision.
It is that the FAI, Funds for the Italian Environment, gave again its old splendour to him by restoring the ancient system of water conveyance, to in 1999 reopen it with the public in 2001.

The FAI is a private Foundation which, since 1975, contributes to protection, the conservation and the development of the heritage artistic, natural and landscape Italian.

Today, it is an oasis invaded of orange trees, lemon trees, mandarin trees, almond trees, fig trees, pistachio trees, quince trees, pomegranates, banana trees, limettiers, bergamot trees, mulberry trees, apple trees, pear trees,…

One comes there to walk there to the calm – only the song of the birds breaks the silence of the place – to smell the perfume of the flowers, to read or taste the jam prepared with the fruits of the garden.

During all of summer, it is the seat of exhibitions, receptions, musical and gastronomical events.

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Gerard CROSSAY

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