Massaciuccoli Romana - Journey to Massaciuccoli, between history and nature - Second Stage

From the reeds of the marsh to the cork oaks of the hills: discovering the Tuscan lake.

The path of the cork oaks starts from the Oasis and climbs up the hills behind the lake. Heading towards the centre of the town, we will come across the exhibition pavilion that precedes the entrance to Massaciuccoli Romana, an ancient villa that overlooked the waters of the lake in Roman times. The archaeological area is enriched by a finely repaired mosaic and a museum that illustrates the history of the site, containing the remains of the villa and the thermal baths of the Venulei. After visiting the complex, we continue our itinerary climbing the path to Compignano and keeping Monte Aquilata on our left. We will soon reach the Crocetta area at Villa Minutoli Tergimi, built on the ruins of an ancient watchtower from the Lombard period.

The sound of footsteps, rhythmic, makes the wooden beams of the walkway creak. All around, you can hear only the chirping of birds and the wind rustling the grass. We are in Versilia, that corner of Tuscany squeezed between the Apuan Alps and the sea, in the northern part of the region. A handful of kilometers from the busy Viareggio seafront, an ancient marshy area is home to a thriving animal and plant community: it is Lake Massaciuccoli, which with over 2,000 square kilometers of surface, forms the largest retro-dune wetland in Tuscany.

What is now a marshy lake was once a brackish lagoon that underwent a slow reclamation process. Human settlements developed around the basin as early as Roman times, still visible today in the archaeological area of Massaciuccoli Romana: here it is possible to visit the local archaeological museum and the remains of the Villa dei Venulei, built at the beginning of the 1st century AD, with its thermal complex in a position overlooking the lake and, further away, the coast.

In Massaciuccoli, near the archaeological area, flocks of birds find a home in the LIPU Oasis of Chiarone, established in 1979 together with the Park of Migliarino, San Rossore and Massaciuccoli. The marshy area is located in a geographical position that makes it an ideal transit and stopover point for a large variety of ornithological species, from the osprey to the black-winged stilt, from the elegant red herons to the rare glossy ibis.

On the other side of the lake is the village of Torre del Lago, a small hamlet famous for having been the refuge of the composer Giacomo Puccini, who moved here to a villa now dedicated to the museum that bears his name.

Around the lake there are paths and trails that lead into contact with the most evocative environments and represent a privileged point of view on those corners where the water gives way to the lands and marsh vegetation.

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