Description:
29-06-2022: Route Km. 9 Elevation gain mt. 350. The village of Fumegai is a short distance from Lake Arsié (or Lago del Corlo), which rises at about 550 meters altitude, whose inhabitants were completely dedicated to agriculture and pastoralism. Fumegai has only 7 houses, all close and abandoned. Here time seems to have stopped and it seems almost that people fled from one moment to the other, leaving the homes intact, with furniture and utensils still in place. What drove the inhabitants of Fumegai to abandon the village between 1920 and 1930? The explanation is simple: life in this corner of the province of Belluno was not easy. The village was quite isolated from the city and for the inhabitants it was not easy to move to look for work, or even just to stock up on what they could not produce. For this reason, one after the other, the young people began to leave their native country and move to one of the nearby centers, in search of greater fortune and a more comfortable life. A few decades later, in the 1960s, a group of hippies decided to occupy the houses of Fumegai, perhaps driven by the desire to create a commune, or fascinated by rural life. But their dreams were shattered soon. It is said that the boys could not overcome the harsh winters and, seized by discouragement and cold, left. The signs left by the hippie community are still visible in some houses, decorated with murals and writings. In particular, on the ground floor of one of the first houses there is a large painting of a woman with long hair adorning a window. Among the Belluno mountains the temperatures were harsh and in winter every house was heated by fireplaces. That's why the inhabitants' clothes were always stained with soot, as if they were all chimney sweeps. Going to the city, these people were immediately recognized by their clothes, and called "fumegai", which in Venetian dialect means "smoked".
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Video length: 21:42