If you are tired of the beaches of Italy, then you may like the sea caves, where you can also swim and cool off on hot days. Italy has several spectacular sea caves that can be found all along the coast. From the popular Blue Grotto on the island of Capri, to the vast Palinuro cave system, these are some of the world's most amazing natural wonders. So, 10 sea caves in Italy in the photo feed.

Blue Grotto, Capri

One of the secret and natural wonders of the world. It is called blue because the light reflects upward from the clear blue sea, illuminating the cave with a magical blue light. Today it is a popular attraction, and the cave was known to the Romans, because Roman structures and statues were found in these places. It is interesting that the grotto has only one entrance from the sea, so getting into this beautiful blue cave only possible by boat. The cave is 56 meters long and 30 meters wide.

Grotto in Castro
especially beautiful karst cave at sea under special protection. The limestone topography of the area gives the cave a unique and subtle eco-system above and below sea level, the colors of these places are breathtaking.

Blue Grotto, Taormina
On the island of Belle, close to Taormina in Sicily, there is another blue grotto that is very popular with the locals, but it is still not open to tourists like the blue grotto in Capri.

Grotto of Neptune, Alghero
Discovered in the 18th century by local fishermen, Neptune's Grotto is part of a cave system that stretches for 4 km, including the underwater cave of Nereo, which is visited every year by thousands of scuba divers. Accessible on foot, Neptune's Grotto is an illuminated cave with spectacular stalactites, stalagmite formations and, of course, a delightful sea.

Grotto dello Poetry, Roca Vecchia, Salento
Legend has it that the beautiful princess loved to swim in the salubrious waters of the cave, and her beauty was so magnificent that the news quickly spread all over Puglia. For the news, legions of poets from all over southern Italy rushed to this region, gathering in this place to compose poems inspired by its natural beauty. The large karst cave behind the cliff in Roca is the place to get some inspiration. The walls are covered with inscriptions in ancient Greek and Latin.

Blue Grotto of Marino, Cala Gonone, Sardinia
This place is very popular among tourists due to its accessibility and vastness. Blue water is everywhere, you can walk along the built bridges from hall to hall, enjoying the cool air and water. You will get a lot of impressions from this place.

Sea caves of Cape Gargano, Puglia
This is a whole complex of caves: "Cave of Two Eyes", "Cave of Tomatoes", "Cave of Smugglers" and many other different caves. Each of the caves of this complex has something special, something that distinguishes them from each other. Maybe it's the splendor of flowers. This is a whole area of ​​unidentified treasures, natural wonders, where the caves are some of the most beautiful in all of Italy.

Sea caves of Palinuro
Tyrrhenian Sea at Cape Palinuro, Salerno is home to the most extensive system caves in Italy. Thousands of diving enthusiasts flock to the huge underwater caves for breathtaking snorkeling, however, the surface caves are just as spectacular.

Emerald Grotto, Sardinia
A small but very pretty Sardinian grotto, the cave is illuminated in the emerald green of the waters around the island. If you are in those parts, then you should definitely visit this place, however, the visit can be very short, because a large number of tourists, and they all want to visit the cave.

Blue grotto on Cavoli beach, Elba island
On the idyllic, quiet beach of Cavoli on the island of Elba, there is a blue grotto. The cave is located at a distance of 600 meters from sandy shore, can be reached by water moped or small boat. Not the most exciting grotto on the list, but it is good because there are few tourists here, and it smells of mystery!

“You know, there’s a cave nearby with a hall so huge that St. Peter’s Cathedral could easily fit in it?” - fellow travelers asked me during the last visit to Trieste - Italian city which is located on the border with Slovenia.

About the cave, which bears the obvious name Grotta Gigante, that is, the "Giant Cave", I have never heard of, so it was immediately decided to go there in order to find out on the spot what it is.

In the photo: entrance to the Great Hall of the Grotta Gigante

Grotta Gigante is located on the limestone Karst plateau near the highway connecting Italy with Slovenia and Croatia. Among Russian travelers this natural tourist site is not particularly popular, moreover, there is not even information about Grotta Gigante in Russian version Wikipedia, which is extremely sad, because the place is very curious.

This concerns not only the impressive size of the Grotta Gigante, because of which it even got into the Guinness Book of Records as the largest cave in the world, equipped for visiting tourist groups, that is, with stairs, lighting and other attributes for a safe descent inside, but and the history of the cave, no matter how strange this phrase may seem to you.

In the photo: thickets of stalactites in the Giant Cave

The giant cave was discovered by speleologists in 1840, and already in 1905 work began on the improvement of the descent in order to make this natural object accessible to tourists. In addition to speleologists, archaeologists also conducted research in the cave, and their findings are the most curious, because they found the remains of two prehistoric people, fragments of ancient ceramics, as well as animal bones at the bottom of the cave, which once lived on the territory of Eurasia, but died out during the last Ice Age. period.

Inspection of Grotta Gigante begins just with a detailed excursion into history and archeology, because the descent into the cave is carried out once an hour, so while you are waiting for your turn, there is a decent amount of time left to explore the exposition of the local museum, arranged directly above the cave. By the way, this approach is more than justified, it turns out that at first you study the theory, and then you move on to the practical part, that is, to a walk through the cave and unrestrained photography of stalactites and stalagmites.

In the photo: stalagmites in the cave resemble mushrooms

The fact that panthers, hairy rhinos, hippos and other animals "lived" in the territory of Eurasia in prehistoric times, the modern halo of habitat of which is limited to Africa, Asia, South and North America, I read it in Guns, Germs and Steel, but it's one thing to read about it, and quite another to see physical evidence with your own eyes.

In the museum, opened at the cave, a whole room is dedicated to prehistoric herbivores and predators that did not survive the last Ice Age, as well as a close acquaintance with the hungry Cro-Magnons. Here you can see the bones of European panthers, rhinos, hippos, bison, hyenas and a European lion found in the cave.

In the photo: European panther bones found in the Giant Cave

In the center of the exhibition is a reconstructed skeleton of a cave bear, these animals became extinct around 29,000 BC. The cave bears were about the size of their polar relatives, and their diet consisted of berries, roots, and other components of the vegetarian diet. The exact reason for the disappearance of cave bears has not been fully established, but historians suggest that in this case, the Ice Age was greatly helped by people who actively hunted in Europe during this period.

In the photo: the skeleton of a cave bear in the museum at the Giant Cave

By the way, about people. During the study of the cave, archaeologists discovered here fragments of ceramics and pottery, as well as arrowheads dating back to the Bronze Age, that is, to the period from 4000 to 1500 BC. To the unanimous opinion as to whether the ancient people lived in the Giant Cave on a permanent basis, or whether the traces of prehistoric civilization just sometimes fell inside the Grotta Gigante, scientists never came, but, I must say, if the giant cave was used by the ancient representatives of Homo sapiens as permanent place of residence, it is even easier to understand their choice today.

In the photo: samples of ceramics and pottery of the Bronze Age, discovered
in the giant cave

The fact is that the temperature inside the cave invariably stays at 11 degrees, and the dimensions of the main hall clearly indicate that a whole tribe could comfortably accommodate here: the length of the cave is 167.70 meters, and the width is 76.30 meters.

In the photo: a giant stalagmite and the Great Hall of the cave

The descent to a depth of 98.50 meters is carried out by stairs, the construction of which was completed in 1908, at the same time not only scientists, but also curious tourists were allowed into the cave. By the way, the flights of stairs of the cave are based on railways- their Grotta Gigante was once presented by the Austrian railways who helped to improve the cave.

Once inside the Grotta Gigante, you involuntarily catch yourself thinking that this is exactly what the front hall in the palace of the dwarf king should look like, since the illumination of the cave allows you to see in detail the columns of stalagmites and stalactites hanging from the ceiling.

The growth of the natural bas-reliefs of the cave directly depends on the amount of precipitation that falls in this part of Italy: during dry periods, the growth rate of stalactites and stalagmites does not exceed one millimeter per thirty years, but in rainy years, underground columns grow, one might say, by leaps and bounds - one millimeter in three years.

Another interesting point is the color of the cave walls, which directly depends on the chemical composition of the rock. In this regard, Grotta Gigante is lucky, she is multi-colored. The gray color of some walls indicates that limestone rock predominates in this area, nearby you can see snow-white walls - they contain pure calcite, and the red and orange walls of the cave indicate that in these places the rock contains calcium carbonate and oxide gland.

In some places in the cave, an attentive tourist can also notice plants, which, by the way, absolutely contradicts the laws of nature. The fact is that any plant needs light to grow, but in caves of this type, complete darkness reigns day and night, but after an artificial lighting system was created inside the Grotta Gigante, ferns, moss and algae immediately began to grow here. So not always human activity leads to the disappearance of plants and animals, sometimes it stimulates the reverse processes.

Although in fact the cave is a single space, it is conventionally divided into two halls: the Great and the Altar. The second hall in this case is just minus the first floor of the Great Hall, but it is not the bottom of the cave either. In fact, one of the tunnels in the Altar Hall can descend to a depth of 250 meters.

In the photo: a stalagmite in the form of a tower in the Grotta Gigante

True, ordinary tourists are not allowed into the Krasta underground at all, but scientists from the University of Trieste often descend here, here they measure the level of the rise of the underground Timavo River, which was formed millions of years ago by Grotta Gigante.

But guests are allowed to walk along the artificial gallery, and in the finale they are invited to climb the Belvedere observation deck, from where a view of the entire cave opens. By the way, it was here in 1840 that a group of researchers headed by engineer Anton Friedrich Lindner descended, discovering the Giant Cave, by the way, scientists climbed into the dungeon on ropes for a reason, they were looking for fresh water in the depths of the Karst massif.

In the photo: The Great Hall of the Giant Cave

Lastly, funny. One of the stalagmites of the cave in its shape is very reminiscent of the statue of the Madonna, therefore, on the eve of Christmas, figures of the Virgin Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus in a manger and the Magi are placed near it. If we recall that in Grotta Giganta, archaeologists discovered ceramics Bronze Age, then the fact that in the cave there was a place for Christmas presepio can be seen as a kind of “continuity of generations”. Although, to be honest, such fruits of human civilization in the Giant Cave look very alien, some copies of prehistoric arrowheads would be much more appropriate here.

Cost of visiting: 12 euros (adult ticket), 9 euros - student, schoolchildren - 8 euros, children from 3 to five years old - 1 euro, children under two years old - free of charge.

Opening hours: from October to March from 10.00 to 16.00, from April to September from 10.00 to 18.00

Address: Società Alpina delle Giulie – Sezione di Trieste del C.A.I. Indirizzo: Via Donota, 2
34121 – Trieste (TS) C.F.: 80016540322 Partita I.V.A.: 00243240322
COORDINATE BANCARIE - codice IBAN: IT84I0892802200010000010249

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Julia Malkova- Julia Malkova - founder of the website project. Former editor-in-chief of the elle.ru Internet project and editor-in-chief of the cosmo.ru website. I talk about traveling for my own pleasure and the pleasure of readers. If you are a representative of hotels, tourism office, but we are not familiar, you can contact me by email: [email protected]

A , Savona (Grotte di Toirano, Savona)

Grottoes of Troyan are located a few kilometers from the sea, in the Val Varatella area in the province of Savona. These grottoes consist of 150 caves, many of which are still not fully explored. Since 1953, some caves have been open to the public. In the Bàsura (witch) cave you can see the skeleton of an ancient bear, in the very large cave called the Pantheon you can see a huge stalagmite covered with stones, which is affectionately called the “pearl of the cave”. The cave walk ends at Tanone Cave, which was used as a shelter during the Second World War during air raids. Today it is used as a colorful concert stage.

Address: Via alle Grotte, Toirano, Savona

Giant cave, Sgonico (Grotta del Gigante, Sgonico)

giant cave is the largest tourist grotto in the world. Located in Sgonico, near Trieste. You can read more about the grotto.

Address: Località Borgo Grotta Gigante, 42/A, Sgonico (Trieste)

Grotta del Vento, Tuscany

Grotta del Vento is in national park"Apuan Alps" of Tuscany. A visit to the caves can last from one to three hours, depending on the route you choose. There you can see stalagmites and stalactites, almost all living ones, i.e. in the growing phase. This grotto also has an adventure route, accompanied by expert speleologists.

Address: Grotta del Vento - Vergemoli (LU)

Frasassi Cave, Marche

These caves have more than 13 kilometers of different routes. A tourist route, accessible to all tourists, has a length of 1.5 km. The walk lasts approximately 75 minutes. During it you can see small underground lakes, stalactites and stalagmites. The most daring and hardy can choose more difficult routes: il percorso azzurro (the walk lasts 2.5 hours) and il percorso rosso (the walk lasts about 4 hours).

Address: Viale Giovanni Marinelli, San Vittore delle Chiuse, Genga (Ancona)

Grotte di Pastena, Frosinone (Grotte di Pastena, Frosinone)

Grotte di Pastena located in the Monti Ausoni mountain range, in the province of Frosinone. During a walk through 10 caves, you can see underground lakes, waterfalls, stalactites and stalagmites. The most colorful place of the caves is a lake called Lago Blu, into which a waterfall flows from a height of 10 meters.

Grotte di Stiffe, Abruzzo

Grotte di Stiffe located in the province of L'Aquila, Abruzzo region. Part of the route through these caves is accompanied by an underground river, which periodically turns into waterfalls. The walk lasts about an hour.

Address: Via del Mulino, 2, Stiffe, San Demetrio ne "Vestini (L" Aquila)

cavesAngela, Campaign(Grotte dell "Angelo, Campania)

Angel Cave located in the province of Salerno, in the town of Pertosa. These caves are already 35 million years old and still continue to amaze and delight visitors. For a walk, you can choose one of three routes of different duration.

Address: Località Muraglione 18/20 - Pertosa (SA)

Castellana Caves, White Grotto, Bari (Grotte di Castellana, Bari, Grotta Bianca)

Caves of Castellane in the province of Bari are among the most beautiful in Italy. The walk takes about two hours. During this time you will walk about 3 kilometers.

Address: Piazzale Anelli, Castellana Grotte (BA)

Grotto Dzinzulusa, Lecce (Grotta della Zinzulusa, Lecce)

Grotto Dzinzuluza located in Lecce.

Address: Via Zinzulusa, Castro (Lecce)

Grotta di Su Mannau, Sardinia(Grotta di Su Mannau, Sardegna).

Grotta di Su Mannau located on the island of Sardinia, in the municipality of Fluminimaggiore. It has a length of more than 8 kilometers and originated about 15 million years ago.

Address: Via Vittorio Emanuele 3, 09010 Fluminimaggiore, Sardegna

In 1938, another miracle of the Apennine Peninsula was discovered. And today, the grottoes of Castellana, or the karst cave of Castellana, are on a par with the most visited caves in Italy, created by nature itself.

The Grottoes of Castellana are located at a depth of 60 (this is the vertical entrance to it) to 122 meters from the surface of the earth (up to 72 meters for visiting) and at an altitude of 330 meters above sea level. The total length of the underground labyrinth is about three kilometers. Geographically, the attraction is located in the commune of Castellana Grotte, which is part of the province of Bari. It, in turn, is an administrative unit Italian region Apulia.

Description of the Grotte di Castellana

Karst cave in Italy is considered the largest natural underground grotto. It consists of several halls of different shapes and sizes. These are the caves:

• La Grave, which means nothing more than the Abyss;
• Black;
• White - recognized as one of the most beautiful in the world;
• Owls;
• Capitoline she-wolf;
• dome;
• Madonnas;
• At the edge;
• Leaning Tower of Pisa;
• Little paradise;
• Serpentine corridor, etc.

Here you can see bewitching stalactites and stalagmites, in some places connected into pillars, as well as fossils of various shapes, crystalline growths and absolutely fantastic colors, skillfully emphasized by special highlights. The temperature inside the caves is in the range of 14-18 degrees Celsius. For the convenience of visitors, paths with stepped descents have been laid.

Interestingly, the grottoes of Castellane have their own fauna, including bats that are completely harmless to those present. Smaller species of living organisms have managed to adapt in a not quite simple ecosystem. These are crustaceans, bugs and even grasshoppers.

IN different time the cave complex has been visited by celebrities such as Aldo Moro and Luigi Einaudi, Gina Lollobrigida and Enrico Mattei. Eight feature films were filmed in the Grotte di Castellana.

Grotte di Castellana: the history of discovery

The famous caves of Italy include the grottoes of Castellana in their list from the first half of the last century, although the history of the cave has more than one million years. For a long period of time, the territory of modern Apulia was immersed in the abyss sea ​​waters, therefore, sediment accumulated here over the millennia, which eventually turned into a layer of limestone mixed with sand several kilometers thick. When, as a result of movements, the surface of the earth's crust rose above sea level, atmospheric precipitation and earth currents gradually washed away the limestone in the weakest places. This led to certain splits and the appearance of cavities characteristic of caves. The inhabitants of a nearby town avoided a gaping hole in the ground, which they called the gate to the abyss. Often, stray domestic and wild animals fell into it and died, so a fetid smell emanated from the inside. Why not the underworld?

A serious attempt to break into the Grotte di Castellana was made by the locals at the end of the 18th century. But the pioneers stopped a few meters from a huge, foul-smelling hole, not daring to go down. For future tourists, a karst cave in Italy called the Grottoes of Castellana was discovered by an Italian speleologist, a native of Bari, Franco Anelli. This happened during a research expedition under his leadership in January 1938. It should be noted that today not all the secrets of the Castellana cave are known. The grottoes are still being explored and studied by specialists, therefore they remain partially closed to ordinary visitors. In 2000, the speleological museum opened its doors, named after the pioneer Grotte di Castellana - Franco Anelli. By the way, his bust is installed in one of the cave halls, above which is the same gaping hole.

Visiting the cave: ticket prices and opening hours

Most of the complex is open to tourists all year round, but access to the grottoes is exclusively organized groups accompanied by a guide (It., English, German, French). There are currently two routes available.

Italy can be called the country of caves. The caves of Italy amaze the imagination with their beauty and grandeur. With more than 10,000 officially registered caves, Italy is one of the largest countries in the world, where caves are located not only in the mountains, but also in sea grottoes. In addition, many of the Italian caves are the very first in the world in any category: the largest, the deepest, with the largest stalactites and stalagmites.

Those , which are open to visitors, can usually only be seen on a tour, and preliminary applications are not always necessary. Special illuminated paths have been built inside most of these caves, and some of them include a series of stairs. The temperature inside the cave can be cold, so bring warm clothes. It is also recommended that you wear sturdy and comfortable walking shoes on the tour.

Caves of Italy review

Frasassi caves

Grotte di Frasassi are among the most impressive caves in Italy. The tour here is quite long, lasting 1 1/4 hours. During the tour, tourists visit several halls with stalactites and stalagmites. The area of ​​this unique natural object so big that Milan Cathedral (the largest Gothic cathedral in the world) can fit inside it. The Frasassi cave complex is located in central Italy, in the Marche region, 65 kilometers from the Italian port city of Ancona.

Grotta Gigante

Gigante Grotto, a giant cave that has been open to visitors for over a hundred years. This grotto was listed in the Guinness Book of Records in 1995 as the largest tourist cave in the world. The huge main hall of the cave can be accessed by climbing the stairs of the tunnel up the mountain. There are many formations inside, including the Ruggiero Column, 12 meters high. The tour lasts only about one hour. The object is located about 10 kilometers from the small Italian seaport of Trieste (can be reached by bus from the city center), in the north-east of Italy, the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region.

Underground caves of Italy Corchia

Monte Corchia, called the empty mountain, has one of the largest cave systems in Europe. Cave labyrinths are located in the Apuan Alps in the northern part of Tuscany, 16 kilometers from the resort town of Forte dei Marmi (Versilia coast), beloved by wealthy Russians. two hour tourist excursion covers almost two kilometers of the 70 kilometers of underground labyrinths inside Corchia. It is believed that here are the most beautiful and spectacular stalactites and stalagmites in the world. Small underground lakes are also very beautiful here.

Cave Monte Cucco

The Grotta di Monte Cucco is one of the deepest in the world cave systems. Total length of the system corresponds to 20 km, but only an 800-meter section is open to tourists. Caves of Italy very popular with tourists. In general, the tour includes a demonstration of three massive caves: Cattedrale, Sala Margherita, and Sala del Becco. The entrance to the cave is located near the very peak of the mountain, so for a visit to underworld will require initially to overcome the 27-meter height along an almost vertical staircase. Visitors can choose from three difficulty levels, two of which require early booking. The Grotta di Monte Cucco is located in Umbria, in the region of Monte Cucco Park.

Grotte di Stiffe

The river runs right through the Grotte di Stiffe, and inside is beautiful waterfall. It is best to admire this beauty in the spring. There are also many stalactites and stalagmites in the cave. The one-hour tour covers 700 meters, and the passage here through the stairs is quite easy. Grotta di Stiffe is located in central Italy, in the Abruzzo region, about 17 kilometers southeast of L'Aquila.

Caves of Italy Grotte Di Castellana

Grotte Di Castellana is a large complex of caves with beautiful stalactites and stalagmites in a limestone plateau. One of the rooms open to visitors has a natural light. There is another unusual white cave here, which is called Grotta Bianca. Visitors can choose to tour the caves with a short or long route. Partial tours cover only one kilometer, duration 50 minutes. While the full tour covers a route of three kilometers, lasting 2 hours. Grotte Di Castellana is located in southeastern Italy, the Puglia region, 11 km from the sea and 17 km north of Alberobello.

blue grotto

The blue grotto Grotta Azzurra, the most famous of Italy's sea caves, is the main attraction on the island of Capri. The refraction of sunlight in the cave provides an iridescent glow in the blue light water. The grotto has been used since prehistoric times and was a favorite pool for the Romans. During the reign of Emperor Tiberius, he had his own villas on the island. This grotto can only be visited by boat tour.

Grotto of Neptune

The Grotte of Neptune, or Neptune's Cave, is located just above sea level at the foot of a cliff, near Alghero on the island of Sardinia. The grotto is not always available for visiting, because at a time when the sea is not calm, excursions are not conducted here. You can get into the grotto by boat from Alghero or from the car park along a staircase of 654 steps carved into the rock. Visitors are guided along an illuminated path so they can see the many stalactites and stalagmites, as well as the salt water lakes present in the cave.

Sassi or Cave in Matera

Matera, a small town in southern Italy, in the Basilicata region, has a fascinating area of ​​caves built into a ravine. This amazing place has been inhabited by people for hundreds of years. Several rock churches are open to the public and there are reproductions of typical cave houses that can be visited. Also, restaurants and hotels were even made in the repaired caves where you can relax.