Strembo
Past and present tales to discover the Adamello-Brenta Reserve
The origins of Strembo go a long way back. It is supposed to be there even earlier than the 14th century, and tradition has it that Strembo resulted from a little settlement in "Afcei" area, dating back to 1150 ca, which was located between the villages of Strembo and Mortaso. The samll town features steep and narrow hallways crossing entrance halls and big, age-old Val Giudicarie style houses. Its main crafts include wood processing, farming and dry-meat manufacturing.
Home to the Adamello-Brenta Nature Reserve, it is the ideal place to practise tennis, mountain biking, fishing and hiking tours featuring any difficulty level.
At the beginning of the century, Strembo was famous for its age-old bell-tower: it was so short, the actual church towered over it. Rendena locals used to say that Strembo inhabitants carried the bell-tower into the church for the night because they feared it could be stolen. Tired of being teased, and given that a new bell-tower had been built in 1927, the young of those days knocked the old one down.
At that time almost every one in the village owned goats, which used to be daily gathered from spring to autumn in the so-called "tampleli". With the horn on his shoulder and the stick in his hand, the "cavrer" (goatherd) used to fetch the flock to pasture. Especially in autumn and winter, numerous family heads used to turn into "moleti" (knife grinders), travelling far and wide with their "mola" (grindstone), to sharpen knives and scissors.