Parco Regionale
Parco Regionale in Piedmont
10 towns
Piedmont holds 10 Parco Regionale sites inside our catalogue. They cluster in the Torino, Cuneo, and Alessandria provinces.
The three most recognised in our catalogue are Chiusa di Pesio, Avigliana, and Susa. 7 more towns carry the mark alongside them.
Chiusa di Pesio
Province: Cuneo · 575 m
The valley mouth town at 575 meters where the Pesio leaves the Ligurian Alps, founded around a Carthusian monastery donated in 1173.
Avigliana
Province: Torino · 383 m
A medieval Savoy town at 383 meters at the mouth of the Susa Valley, between two glacial lakes and the Sacra di San Michele.
Susa
Province: Torino · 503 m
The Roman gateway to the Cottian Alps at 503 meters, capital of the Alpes Cottiae and seat of the Cozii under Augustus and Cottius.
Alagna Valsesia
Province: Vercelli · 1,191 m
A Walser village at 1,191 meters under Monte Rosa, settled from the Swiss Valais in the 13th century and known to off-piste skiers worldwide.
Ormea
Province: Cuneo · 736 m
A heart-shaped Ligurian-Alps borgo at 736 meters in the upper Tanaro valley, the southernmost town in Piemonte before the Imperia ridge.
Usseaux
Province: Torino · 1,416 m
A Val Chisone village at 1,416 meters with four scattered borgate and more than forty murals painted across the stone facades.
Arona
Province: Novara · 212 m
A Lake Maggiore town at the southern tip of the lake, watched over by a 35-meter copper colossus of San Carlo Borromeo finished in 1698.
Fenestrelle
Province: Torino · 1,154 m
A Val Chisone village at 1,154 meters below the largest alpine fortress in Europe, three kilometers of stone climbing 650 vertical meters up the ridge.
Serralunga di Crea
Province: Alessandria · 302 m
A Basso Monferrato commune of 503 holding the Sacro Monte di Crea, a UNESCO Sacri Monti site of 23 chapels around an Eusebian sanctuary.
Venaria Reale
Province: Torino · 269 m
A Savoy town on the edge of Torino, built around the Reggia di Venaria, a UNESCO baroque palace with sixty hectares of gardens.
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From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Putignano
Province: Bari
Europe's longest-running carnival — Putignano Carnevale has run continuously since 1394, with 631 years of cartapesta papier-mâché floats, a 26,000-resident Murgia town on the Bari–Lecce plateau, and the Grotta del Trullo karst cave inside the centro.
Pistoia
Province: Pistoia
Italy's nursery capital and the medieval Tuscan rival that gave its name to the pistol — a quietly extraordinary centro storico of zebra-striped Romanesque churches, Andrea della Robbia's polychrome frieze on the Ospedale del Ceppo, and Italy's Capital of Culture 2017, all 30 minutes from Florence by train.
Tropea
Province: Vibo Valentia
Cliff town on a tufa headland over the Tyrrhenian Coast of the Gods, with a Norman monastery on a sea rock.
Caldes
Province: Trento
A scattered Val di Sole commune on the Noce, six hamlets gathered around a thirteenth-century tower-house castle that once belonged to the Thun family.
Cantiano
Province: Pesaro e Urbino
A border borgo at 374 meters under Monte Catria on the old Via Flaminia, known for the Good Friday Turba and the sour-cherry visciola harvest.