Culture and Religion

Atri

Our hotel is 10 minutes away by car from Atri, a small town rich in art, history and culture. It boasts a pretty historical centre and magnificient views.
More ancient than Rome, it even has minted coins which are stored not only in the Atri Museum but also in the British Museum of London. The Adriatic sea takes its name from this town. Its 13 churches boast the transition of the most important religious orders: the Benedictine order, the Franciscan, the Dominicans and the Augustinians.
Atri is the Queen of the Teramo hills: it rests on a hill trebled by two small valleys.
The ancient “Hatria Picena” keeps a record of its past. The construction of the Basilica-Cattedrale started in 1260 and ended only in 1305: it owns the unique Porta Sancta outside of Rome. Every year, it remains opened just for a week as from 14 August. The cathedral stands on the same location as an earlier Roman baths and preserves the painter’s oeuvre of Renaissance, Andrea De Litio.
Moreover, the medieval theatre of Atri is still intact.
Today, the Acquaviva royal Palace, built in the 14th century on the site of a Roman cistern and restructured in the XVI century, hosts Atri municipality.
There are also many museums in Atri which help to preserve the city’s history: the Capitular Museum, the Archeological Museum and the Museum of Medieval and Renaissance musical instruments.
A cloistered convent wasestablished exactly 750 years ago.

San Gabriele

The sanctuaty of San Gabriele is 50 km away from our hotel: every year thousands of pilgrims visit this sanctuaty. It is located at the foot of the Gran Sasso mountain, surrounded by a beautiful landscape. Here, you can visit the museum next to the ancient convent and, at the centre, you will see the well of S. Francesco, dug in 1216 along the border of Palmèrii di Tossicia, Castiglione di Penne and Conti di Pagliara di Isola. The gate of the Franciscan church has been rebuilt in 1924.

Between the paintings, l’Immacolata del Bellisarii (1775) and the first picture of San Gabriele by Grandi (1879). Out of the museum, you could see the cameretta del Transito, where San Gabriele lived and died on 27 febbraio 1862.

Scala Santa di Campli

40 km from Pineto, Campli is a quiet, rural village whose importance is linked to the past. It is a village of great traditions and monuments such as the Scala Sancta, adjacent to S. Paul’s Church: this Scala Sancta absolves our sins to gain plenary indulgence and make us revive like immaculates.

It is a little wonder that the Catholic community jealously preserves as an imitation of the one Jesus climbed to come face to face with Ponzio Pilato; an imitation of the Scala Sancta in the Cathedral of S. Giovanni in Laterano.