SHARRYLAND
Along the Valley of the Paper Mills
A walk from the Old Bridge to the Paper Museum, going up the river
Where is
What it is and where it is
The Toscolano, which collects water from Mount Tombea (1950 m), is one of the main tributaries of Lake Garda and before widening into a delta is crossed by a stone bridge dating from the early 16th century. The size of the structure, which forms an arch over twenty meters wide, gives an idea of how much the watercourse can swell during floods. Usually, however, the stream has a calm disposition and an always copious flow, which in the past allowed numerous water wheels to be implanted along its course to move the mechanisms of sawmills and paper mills.
Why it is special
Reaching the ridge of the bridge, turning our gaze upstream, we get our first glimpse of theimpassable valley known as the 'valley of the paper mills' because of the many such factories, now disused because paper production follows different processes and takes place elsewhere. One glimpses the ruins of these, alongside the hydraulic works that fed them, along the road up the watercourse: a beautiful route, punctuated by several tunnels, which at one point reaches a complex topped by a chimney more than 30 meters high: the Paper Museum, which is absolutely worth the stop.
Not to be missed
A visit to the Paper Museum has its most interesting moment in the demonstration of the paper cycle, as it took place in Dante Alighieri's time. When people go on the subject today, they mostly think of the pulp made from poplar trees. At that time, on the contrary, the main raw material was textile fibers, in the form of rags, first shredded and macerated with water and quicklime. The resulting pulp was then spread within sheet-sized shapes; this was followed by pressing, drying, and finally the finishing necessary for it to be able to be written on its surface.
A bit of history
The paper industry was introduced to Toscolano in the fourteenth century and reached its greatest development in the second half of the nineteenth century, when the road up the stream was opened so that the factories, lined up along the bank, could take advantage of its hydraulic power and draw the water needed for production. Toscolano remained at the continental top of the industry for centuries, but gradually had to surrender to the changing times. The last factory to cease operations, in 1962, was turned into the Paper Museum.
Curiosities
The walk from the Old Bridge to the Paper Museum passes through a riverine environment where water not only murmurs in the stream at the bottom of the valley, but also falls from above with a trickle that makes plants that love extreme humidity thrive. For example, the maidenhair maidenhair (Adiantum capillus-veneris), a delicate fern with frayed leaves that covers entire rock walls. The real curiosity in this environment, however, is Pinguicola alpina, a tiny carnivorous plant whose leaves secrete a viscous substance fatal to insects that are attracted to its violet flowers.
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