On the Costa Teatina vacation means finding a sea where to go fishing or swimming in the coves, it means dicover the gravelly estuaries of rivers, walk on the dunes, recognize the colors of the coastal meadows.Sea, “trabocchi” and flowered hills are the addition to famous monuments and wherever the coast of Chieti is a paradise for the senses, not least among which is the taste.
The 60 km of coast, are considered the most beautiful of Abruzzo, where the environment is a value protected so that many places can boast the recognition of the Blue Flag, awarded for the sea and services quality.
Trabocchi Coast Abruzzo’s itinerary Italy’s “wooden spiders”
Known as the “Trabocchi Coast”, because of these fantastic fishing machines, Chieti coast is generally low, with beaches interrupted by headlands, including the first from the north cliff of Torre Macchia, Pizzuta on which stands the Aragonese Castle of Ortona, Cavaluccio in the municipality of Rocca San Giovanni and others till arrive to Punta Aderci and Punta Penna.
The sandstone cliffs that give life to the typical environment of the Mediterranean is accented with flowering yellow broom and shrubs of liquorice, mixed asparagus, fennel marine, the maidenhair fern (also known as Jupiter’s beard).
Even on the coast it does not miss the low vegetation of great interest with the ditches, chests of vegetation and wildlife biodiversity, and with large tracts forest including ilex coast of Torino di Sangro, a rare example of coastal forest that includes rare plants and animals.
Further south, on the banks of the river sinello it extends the precious relic of Don Bosco Venancio. After Punta Aderci and coves of the coast in Vasto, San Salvo welcomes us with the Mediterranean Botanical Garden.
To the variety of approaches of the coast is added the even more diversified structure of the marine landscape. The environment is densely populated with aquatic life. The rocks are home to valuable fish species and rare and protected organisms. So much variety makes the coast teatina the natural habitat of many animal species, both resident and migratory. It is not uncommon to find terns, cormorants, birds of prey or marsh turtle, especially in the dunes ranging from the mouth Osento to reserve Punta Aderci.
Dotted with mostly hilly villages, the coast has very ancient settlements that show characters and similarities to the Mediterranean but also changes to a complex cultural landscape woven over centuries of navigation practiced beyond the borders of the Adriatic.
Perfume and taste
Very important and well know is the food and wine-component in the Trabocchi Coast. The uniqueness of the landscape, the wealth of biodiversity on land and in the sea, the cleanliness of the water and air that the people of Abruzzo have defended and are still defending with conviction, are the context in which you can enjoy special smells and tastes. The fish soup (“brodetto di pesce”) is a quick and easy dish for which are indispensable fresh fish of the sea of this coast: scorpion fish, weever, big head, cob, red mullet, hake, dogfish, race, squid, seasoned with extra virgin olive oil, fresh tomatoes, garlic, parsley and pepper.
Other dishes of “poor” cook now got back by the chefs of the many restaurants on the coast are the vegetables with the fish: broccoli with pizza and cod, crabs with zucchini, peppers with grilled squid, cuttlefish with peas. It’s not possible to quit the famous and tasty maltagliati with shellfish sauce.
Traditional sweets are in San Vito the celliripieni, oncegreetings for the wedding: composed of grape jam with black walnuts and dark chocolate chopped, cinnamon and lemon peel into small pieces wrapped in fragrant pastry flour, extra virgin oil and white wine.
Enhance the seafood cook fine white wines, rose and red wines: Trebbiano, Pecorino, Passerina, Cococciola, Cherry, Montepulciano, products of the sunny hills near the coast.
It‘s rare to still find cooked wine, once a fundamental element of desserts served in the lunches of the holidays.