Molino di Nazareno

实用信息

• Historical landmark
• Open 24 hoursEvery day
• Under 1 kmfrom Alto Reno Terme center
• Good for kids
• 4.7 / 563 reviews
• Alto Reno Terme

A mill that once fed the mountain

Granaglione has long been called the "town of hydrangeas," but its older story is written in chestnuts. Up through the 1960s this was a land of shepherds, woodcutters and small farms, where the chestnut was bread for people who could not easily reach the valley floor. A mill built into the slope was a vital piece of infrastructure: it turned grain — and the dried chestnuts ground into sweet flour — into the food of the surrounding hamlets. Molino di Nazareno, working until the 1970s, is the last vivid reminder of that economy, its tall stone shell holding on to the mountainside exactly as it did when the wheel still turned.↗↗

The waterfall and the emerald pool

What visitors come for, even more than the millhouse itself, is the water. Just beside the old building a cascade tumbles down, its water so clear it looks like glass, gathering in a deep pool of emerald green that shifts toward turquoise at the edges. The basin is wrapped in thick forest, and a cold, drinkable spring rises close by, so the whole glen feels cool and shaded even in high summer. It is a small place, but the setting — stone mill, falling water, green pool, tall trees — makes it feel discovered rather than built, which is part of its charm.↗

How to get there

The mill lies in the locality of Casa Lazzaroni, off the road that threads the Randaragna valley above Granaglione. The recommended approach is a short walk: from Casa Lazzaroni take the path on the left, beside the road that runs toward Casa Moschini along the torrent, and in well under 100 metres you reach the mill and the falls. Coming up from Randaragna instead, you take the lane that drops down to the mill at the Randaragna bend and work your way back along the stream. The setting is wild and the access is on foot or by mountain bike, so treat it as a nature stop rather than a developed site.↗

Adding it to a day in the valley

Molino di Nazareno is one of the named highlights of a panoramic slow-cycling loop through the authentic Apennine hamlets around Granaglione, a route that also passes the Sanctuary of Calvigi, the little castle of Granaglione and the stone villages of Lustrola and Borgo Capanne. The detour to the mill is made from Casa Lazzaroni, and the descent toward Molino del Pallone and the Reno valley offers a summer riverside spot where you can cool off as people used to. Pairing the waterfall with a wander among the hydrangea-draped villages and the chestnut woods turns a single curiosity into an easy half-day outing in the hills above Porretta Terme.↗↗