In one of the most popular resorts on Lake Garda, Brenzone, we find a forgotten gem: the abandoned village of Campo. In this village, reachable only on foot, the houses are leaning against each other and dominated by the remains of a fortress that appears suddenly. To reach the village you can start from Castello di Brenzone.
There is evidence of Campo as early as 1023 A.D., a long history that faded at the beginning of the 20th century. It was probably abandoned due to the impracticability of the road that connects it to the valley, because when the landscape becomes an everyday beauty, and therefore a little more obvious, it lifts the bodies’ fatigue less and less. Two handfuls of houses are cut off by a central street. Of the collapsed houses there remain echoes of stone voices, and precise documentation in the maps of the Napoleonic land register of 1818 and the Austrian one of 1843.
Towards the mountain, there is a blanket of deciduous forest. Remaining are the emblematic remains of the ancient castle and the small Romanesque church of San Pietro in Vincoli, completely restored in the 18th century, with frescoes from the 13th and 14th centuries. The fresco cycle is the work of master Giorgio, son of Federico da Riva, as reported in the apsidal inscription dated 1358. The structure, at the end of the tratturo that leaves the village towards Prada, is owned by the parish of San Giovanni Battista di Brenzone. From the high road you can access a small basin, muffled with moss and carpets of leaves, which contains an ancient fountain.
