Tour of Lecce and the hidden urban forest

In Lecce there is a corner of nature filled with mysteries and wonders: it is a place unknown to many, beyond a small gate that seems to overlook the void.

Over the gateway one encounters instead a veritable "urban forest," magically grown in an old quarry that has been disused for many, many years on San Cesario Street.

Time has adorned the quarry with trees, bushes, grasses and flowers, which now populate the depressions, hollows and various terraces once the workplaces of the Lecce stone "quarrymen." A precious treasure chest with ancient small gardens and vegetable gardens, hemmed in by long-forgotten dry stone walls.

A space that tells stories and preserves memories: you can discover them by following footprints and tracks along the paths among nature, when hovels appear among the rocks and steep walls to shelter and store work tools. 

And so today one can traverse the history of the golden Lecce stone and of the men who with hard work and skill made Lecce the city of Baroque, in a fascinating pathway among the plants, the imposing trees, the fruits in memory of the lush gardens of the past and the flowers carried by the wind.