Collecting free Italian souvenirs
My favourite Italian souvenirs are free. I love collecting sea shells, stones and broken glass as holiday mementos.
The south coast of the Gargano peninsula in Puglia is not only extremely beautiful with white limestone cliffs lining emerald green and opal blue waters. It is also a treasure trove for geologists looking for traces of prehistoric wildlife in the rocks. And I suppose you could have the same kind of adventures along other limestone coasts.
Time and Age Encapsulated
In Vieste, we once met a young Dutch couple of geology students, who went out early each morning and returned late at night after field trips along the coast. According to them the Gargano peninsula had been an island in the Early Miocene (which – according to Wikipedia – is a period of climate and landscape change millions of years ago, when new mammals started to evolve).
At that time, there were no large animals on Gargano, so smaller species like mice, hamsters and hedgehogs evolved quickly into spectacular forms that have been preserved as fossils in the limestone. It was these freakish fossils the geologists hoped to find with their hammers and chisels.
Limestone cliffs along the south coast of Gargano
A Memorable Education
Fascinated by the idea of reading the past in a piece of stone, I started to study the hard surfaces hoping to find traces of a beetle or a wasp, yet nothing much ever materialized. But diving around a tiny limestone island we came upon heaps of sea urchin shells – not to mention some prickly live ones. None of them had yet been turned into fossils, but the shells are very pretty with interesting patterns and colours.
And collecting sea urchin shells became our vacation field study supplementing other grand collections of sea shells, desert sand, broken tiles and naturally sand blown glass shards. Even for tourists, it’s amazing how much affection and meaning can be invested in and deducted from a handful of pebbles.
What do you collect, when you are travelling? And what is your best free Italian souvenir?
Sand! That’s what I often bring home. Keep it in little containers in the window sill of a little used room.
I love collecting seashells! I have pretty dishes of them in my bathroom. It reminds me of being a kid in Florida.
I have glass from a trip to England I did when I was young and have sea shells and sand from several places. Love the memories they bring back!
Sounds like a fun day! I collect artwork or frame my photos, but I’m running out of room so I should start collecting shells.
I love sea shells and they always make for great souvenirs! I also collect pebbles. Actually one of my favorite souvenirs are some colorful pebbles I picked from the beach in Portugal. It was December and freezing cold and I ended up all wet because the hubby didn’t bother to tell me there was a big wave behind me coming my way while I was posing for him… but now this is a fun memory :)
I collect photos. I tend to be a minimalist, so I do not look for souvenirs when I travel. Although if something really stands out to me and makes me smile, I’ll bring it home.
I also collect shells and stones from around the world, we have a big glass vase that we store them in on our windowsill at home, but I have just read on the gov.uk website that it’s illegal in italy so now I am terrified to bring any home! It says: “It is illegal to remove sand, shells or pebbles from coastal areas in Italy. Doing so may result in heavy fines.” :(
Wow, I didn’t know that. I’ve never seen myself as a lawbreaker, so I’d better start looking for new free souvenirs to collect. Thanks for the warning.