Following the Footsteps of PinocchioJun 22, 2009

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The real name of Carlo Collodi, the author of Pinocchio, was Carlo Lorenzini. He took the name of a small village in Tuscany as his pseudonym. Collodi, 60 km from Florence, is the home village of his mother. Today any visitor who comes to Collodi can go to Il Parco di Pinocchio a Collodi – The Park of Pinocchio in Collodi. There are many puppet shows conducted in the park, as well as many sculptures and mosaics depicting the story of Pinocchio. The park entrance fee is only 8,5 Euros and the premises are well equipped with picnic areas and a restaurant, called Osteria del Gambero Rosso.

Another interesting site in Collodi is the Villa Garzoni, located across the street from the Pinocchio Park. The villa stand on the top of the hill and along the steep slopes of this hill you can see astounding cascades of gardens, that impress visitors with their geometric symmetry of Renaissance and Baroque style composition. There is also a labyrinth made of plants informs About.com. If you wish to continue the exploration of the Pinocchio places then you will need to relocate to the town of Vernante, near the Piedmont border. This is the place where the illustrator of the Pinocchio story lived, Attilio Mussino.

Much like Collodi in Tuscany, Vernante became the “town of Pinocchio’s Uncle”. Starting in 1989 the walls of the town’s buildings were painted with images from the Pinocchio story originally drawn by Mussino. Thus, the whole town became one big monument of the illustrator’s works – an open-air museum. Yet another site in Vernante is Il Cavallino – an authentic Irish pub, whose owner is an ardent fan of everything Celtic. He speaks very good English and can tell many stories about the town and the whole region.