The Lago di Lavarone has received theprestigious BLUE FLAG award for many years,attesting to the quality of the lake and its beaches,the services available to the community andguests, as well as the commitment to protectingand enhancing the lake and natural heritage.The lake also has an illustrious history, asnotable personalities have chosen Lagodi Lavarone as their favorite mountainvacation spot over time: among them,starting from the year 1900, Sigmund Freud.“Since Minna (his sister-in-law, n.d.r.) wantedto enjoy the joys of an alpine stage, by amountain route of breathtaking beauty, wereached Lavarone (1200 m), a plateaunext to the Valsugana, where we found themost beautiful coniferous forest and anunexpected solitude.” — Sigmund FreudThe day began with a three or four-hour walkin the “splendid woods” of Lavarone; generally,the whole family participated in these walks.Freud wore Tyrolean attire: short pants withconspicuous suspenders and a green hat witha tuft of chamois beard on one side, a stick withan iron tip, and, in case of rain, a furry alpinecloak. He had a particular knack for findingmushrooms, his passion. The damp woods ofLavarone were full of them. He moved alone,leaving the group, and when he found them, hewould cover them with his hat and call everyoneto discover the tasty bounty by blowing awhistle. But the expeditions also aimed atfinding wild strawberries and blueberries, andthe endless discovery of rare wildflowers “withthe task of identifying them accurately, for fun.”And Lavarone was also the place where he hadnew and unique experiences: the first time in acar thanks to a friend from Padua, the uniquespectacle of a military balloon test above thelake, dinner with Archduke Franz Ferdinand.Despite these pleasant distractions, Freuddid not neglect reading, studying, and writing.Here in Lavarone, he received his students, whocame specifically from Vienna to confer with themaster, such as the future Nobel Prize winner,Robert Barany. And in this “dear old refuge,” hecomposed “Gradiva,” walking along the pathsthat border the lake or meditating alone “inthe open air, moving from one stone table toanother.”
