Campodimele : Where the time stops

As a rule, only a few people are blessed with long healthy life. But in some part of the world there are places where the average life span of the residents is 85-100 years. Campodimele is known as Europe's 'village of longevity'. It is uncommon for Campodimelani to die before 85 with many of them reaching happily over 100 years old.

The village is unique for the long life of its residents and studied by researchers worldwide to unveil the mystery behind their long life. But maybe is not difficult to understand why they live long.The first feeling for a traveler who walks around in the village is getting convinced that it’s useless to be in a hurry. Its inhabitants walk and live peacefully along his alleyways and serene countryside breathing clean, fresh air and drinking the healthy spring water at the local spring.

  A view in the village

Researchers proved that the villagers live a serene and stress free life spending their life in the proximity of close relatives and to the natural rhythm of Mother Nature. By tradition, they sleep by the dusk and wake up quite early in the morning. Family and community are important here and everyone lives near friends and relatives socializing daily.

The landscapes around the village are magically bucolic with patches of green fields broken by olive groves and dense woods with mineral spring water named La Faggetina flowing from a rock down to the slopes of Mount Faggeta. The other fundamental secret of the villagers’ long life lies in their healthy diet. So pure countryside air, low stress levels of rural life and the fabulous local cuisine are to thank for this.

Their eating habits are very balanced and dictated by an ancient, healthy Mediterranean-style diet of other times. The favorable natural environmental conditions and typical diet, rich in beans, pasta, fresh vegetables, dried fruit and cheese are considered the most important factors to the happy longevity. All the ingredients are produced in Campodimele.

The locals’ daily diet is mandated by fresh fruits, green vegetables, milk, sprouts and boiled cereals. Women pick the ingredients and prepare them in circle, eating in a relaxed setting, sitting down together for dinner and lingering over their food. The fruit and vegetables are collected following the season and consumed fresh daily so that the vitamins do not to die out by the time they are eaten.

The tasty local meat is also fresh and comes from roaming animals, and organic free-range beef, sheep and pork are the norm here. The pork is often home-made into sausages or ham. The sheep and goat’s milk cheese is free of pesticides and artificial hormones and each meal includes a moderate amount of wine: vines grow on trellises outside every house and each household makes around 400 liters of wine a year. Wine contains antioxidants. The cicerchia is a legume, a variety of beans known to have been consumed thousands of years ago in the Middle East and the laina is a homemade pasta made with just flour and water without eggs, spread with the beans cooked in a sauce of tomatoes, onion and garlic, and served with dried ricotta made from goat's milk.

Still cooked in the traditional old style, dishes such as pasta and beans, the local laina and fagioli, the healthy local soup of cicerchie , the ciammotte (snails) with traditional green sauce and sugo di caprettone (goat sauce) are typical of this small village hidden in the mountains. Uphill along the stables, smelling the ancient fragrance of a soup and home made bread cooked in ovens with wood, the traveler reaches the centre of the small village. Here a three hundred years old elm seems to be the symbol of time slowing down: a sign that nature and humans in this place expand the time’s dimension up and make the distinctive essence of the village.

It’s clear that in this tiny village time signed an agreement with people, thanks to a peaceful remoteness, healthiness of food and air: this harmony is called longevity. The peacefulness one can feel once there is so different from the stressful way of living of modern times that doesn’t allow getting the true and profound meaning of life. Campodimele seems to be created by time’s wisdom and its people, landscapes, history and that powerful force called daily life follows closely the natural rhythm of the seasons. Campomele’s people elixir of life is the village itself.