@brittarnhild
An hour south of Roma there used to be the small medieval town of Ninfa, founded in the eight century and destroyed by the inhabitants of hostile neighbours in 1381. Ninfa and the surrounding land has always belomged to the venerable Caetani family, and in the 1920ies members of the family started to plant a garden among the ruins of Ninfa.
The garden, which is not far from Terracina where our friends Brit and Hans have their apartment, is open to visitors only one Sunday a month, and so far I have not had any possibility to go there. This time our stay in Terracina included no Sunday, but then, quite by chance, we learned that the garden would have an extra opening day on Friday April 25, a red calendar day in all of Italia.
We knew there would be queues, so we were up early and were among the first ones let into the garden. We had to follow an Italian guide, but Brit, who speaks fluently Italian, translated some information for us, we could understand some ourselves, and also we soon discovered, as we already knew, that the language of garden beauty is international.
I have been to many botanical gardens around the world, and I´ve taken you to quite a few of them as well, but this is the first one built on the ruins of a medieval city. This gave it quite its own charm.
We were a big group walking together, and we had to follow the guide. I would have loved to walk around by myself, taking my own time, exploring the nooks and corner, finding my own treasures. But actually, our walk worked fine, and people were very good at paying attention to each other for photographing.
Ninfa means nymph, and as we know, nymphs love water.
Water plays an important part in the garden.
Walking around was like walking inside a painting.
Walking around was like living a dream.
I might go back to the Garden of Ninfa, or I might not.
But no matter what happens, I will bring this first visit with me.
Deep in my heart.
Thank you Brit and Hans for taking us there :-)
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You can read more about the garden here.
