The Setting
Casa Campodonia, Cinque Terre, Italia
The workshop takes place in our home in Italy, Casa Campodonia, a rustic farmhouse in the mountains above Cinque Terre and the Mediterranean coast. By car, we are only twenty minutes from the villages and the sea.
Our house is in an isolated valley of chestnut and pine trees, with an occasional farm. Our only neighbours are a family living next to us. They are farmers who produce most of their own food, raise goats, chickens, and rabbits, make their own cheese, and like most Italians in this region, grow grapes and olives and produce wine and oil for their own use. The area is well known to villagers for fungi - mushrooms that grow in abundance in the rainy seasons.
Our neighbour, Margherita, does the cooking for our workshops.
We usually eat our lunch and dinner on the terrace, and if the
weather is not suitable, a large room in the neighbour's house
is available to us. They have enjoyed meeting people from around
the world and sharing their world with us, and they have been
an integral part of our workshops.
The workshop schedule allows ample time for trips to the villages and to the beach during the day. The five villages of the Cinque Terre have long been favoured vacation spots for Italian and other European tourists, and are very lively during the summer months. A local train provides frequent and inexpensive runs between the villages, making day trips quite feasible. There are many hiking trails connecting all of the villages which offer easy to challenging walks. Quiet time at home and leisurely walks in the forest are welcome retreats from the activities in the villages.
The Workshop venue is easily reached by train or auto from any city in Italy. We are six hours from Rome and three and a half hours from Milan by train. Participants will be picked up at the train station upon arrival. All applicants will be provided with detailed directions.