Mountain Biking Highlight
Recommended by 119 out of 120 mountain bikers
This Highlight is in a protected area
Please check local regulations for: Area naturale protetta di interesse locale Pietramarina
Location: Carmignano, Prato, Tuscany, Italy
Near the top of Pietramarina, one of the most fascinating places in Montalbano, lies a strange rock formation, a single large sandstone monolith, which stands isolated in the holm oak forest. They call it the Devil's Boulder, because someone recognized the imprint of the Evil One's goat's paw in an ancient engraving at the foot of the rock. A series of steps dug directly into the stone help you climb to the top of the boulder and once upon a time, when the forest was less developed, from up there the view could extend to the sea and the distant island of Gorgona
There are those who recognize the boulder as an Etruscan altar, but most likely the staircase was dug in the recent past by the inhabitants of Bacchereto with the aim of helping the first tourists to go up and admire the landscape.
There can be no doubt, however, that that wonderfully isolated boulder did not remain indifferent to the Etruscans who inhabited the citadel for six hundred years, whose excavations are visible today just a few meters away.
Indeed, it is probable that the boulder was actually frequented in remote times: on its surface, among the engravings and writings left from the early twentieth century to today, some deeper and more rounded grooves seem to belong to peoples and uses lost in the mists of time.
March 9, 2022
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