Cascata delle Marmore

Last Friday I decided at the last minute to go with some other seminarians who were trying to go see the Waterfall of Marmore. This is the largest man-made waterfall in the world. It was begun by the Romans in 271 BC to drain the swamps around the ancient city of Rieti. A canal was dug to the edge of the cliffs in order to drain the water. This solved the problem of malaria that plagued Rieti, but when the Velino River flooded, water overflowed to the point of threatening the city of Terni. This waterfall remained a contentious subject until the flooding problem was finally solved under Pope Pius VI in 1787. Today, the waters power a hydroelectric plant, and the water is released over the falls at different times.

We arrived in Terni to find out that most of the buses were not running because of the holiday of Ferragosto. I have heard many times that Italy shuts down in the summer for vacation, but it was never real to me until now. As we walked around Terni, we realized that every single shop was closed. It was like the town had been evacuated. It was amazing to see because there is no way that any town in the US would be able to completely shut down for vacations. The Italians approach life in a completely different way. Terni is a large industrial town, and every single plant and factory that I saw was shut down.

When we finally arrived at the waterfall, I was amazed by its size. The total height of all of the falls together is 541 feet, while the tallest single drop is 272 feet. The falls are surrounded by a haze of water vapor from the spray off the rocks at the bottom. There is a free bus that brings people to the top of the falls, and our original plan was to ride the bus to the top and hike back down beside the falls. As we waited for the bus, we were able to experience first hand the Italian concept of "standing in a line". As the buses approached, everyone begins to push and shove until they are in a position to fight their way into the bus. They end up strung out along the road, and surge to wherever the bus stops. There is no real advantage to being in the front or back because it all depends on where the bus stops. Once the bus stops, all of the yelling starts. I didn't understand all of the yelling, but it started with one woman saying that they needed to let her into the bus first because she was carrying a child. At this point, everyone else with children starts yelling and screaming. The whole time that this is going on, there are two empty buses waiting to pull up as soon as the first one is filled. As funny as it was to watch, we decided to hike to the top instead of fighting the "line" anymore.

The park is beautiful. When we entered, I was surprised to find out that there is whitewater that comes right off of the base of the waterfall. I met a local paddler who said that he might be able to set me up with some gear for paddling. As my friends describe it, I quickly became "a kid in a candy store." I enjoyed walking up the creek and watching the rafts come down. Eventually we began the hike up beside the waterfall. At one point, we were able to stand in the spray coming off the bottom of the first drop. We were instantly drenched which was a nice way to cool off. The top of the falls are beautiful, and give an amazing view of the valley below. We decided to hike back down the mountain to get to the bus back to Terni. Unfortunately, we missed the bus we needed to take, and had to wait for about 40 minutes for the next bus away from the Falls. While we were waiting we had our first porchetta paninis. To call it a pork sandwhich wouldn't do it justice. At the bottom of the falls are numerous vendors with whole pigs that have been roasted. When you want a sandwich, they carve the meat right off of the pig.

We finally made it down the mountain to find that we only had one train left to Assisi. We hopped on that train, and when we got to our connecting train we discovered that our connecting train had been cancelled. After that, we ended up taking a bus to get from Foligno to Assisi. Unfortunately, our bus was going to be stopping at the base of the mountain that Assisi is on, and of course all of the buses to the top had already stopped by the time we arrived. The guys chose me to try and convince the driver of the bus we were on to take us to the top. I was amazed that my Italian ended up being capable of telling him what I wanted, but I was not able to convince him to drive us up to the top. It ended up being a long walk back, but the day was worth it. Next time, however, we will remember to check the bus schedules ahead of time!