In Collodi, in the Valdinievole, to mark the bicentenary of Pinocchio’s father

In this summer marking the bicentenary of Carlo Collodi’s birth, one simply cannot miss a trip to the Valdinievole region of Tuscany to stroll through the village nestled at the foot of the hill where Carlo Lorenzini – the real name of the author of *The Adventures of Pinocchio* – was born. He loved this place because his mother was born there and he himself had spent his summers there as a sensitive child. La Rocca – Villa Garzoni, which belonged to a family loyal to the Florentine Ghibelline faction – stands on the ruins of the castle and boasts a beautiful Italian-style garden (where Lorenzini’s father worked as a gardener); the medieval houses, the towers and the panoramic parish church of San Bartolomeo constantly bring to mind the mischief of the world’s most mischievous and famous puppet. A visit to Pinocchio Park, which is celebrating its 70th anniversary, is an absolute must: through statues and installations such as Pietro Consagra’s Carabiniere, the Cat and the Fox, the Blue Fairy’s House, right up to the Great Shark, you can experience the atmosphere of a toyland, brought up to date by an interactive museum. In Marina di Pietrasanta, the La Versiliana Festival takes place as part of a well-established summer tradition, featuring a programme of shows staged in the park of the same name on the Versilia coast, covering an area of 800,000 square metres. You can stay at Villa Sermolli, a boutique hotel housed in a 16th-century building in the medieval village of Buggiano Castello, in the heart of the Valdinievole. The Collodi200 programme features numerous theatre performances staged throughout the summer in this wild and fairy-tale-like gem in the province of Pistoia.