Care for a Walk in Nervi Park with Empress Sissi?

One day late in the 19^th century, Empress Elisabeth of Austria – on a visit to the Riviera di Levante – decided to go out for a walk. Elisabeth, the semi-estranged wife of Emperor Franz Joseph I, was famous for her eccentricities and, among other things, an avid walker.

That afternoon, she took a ride in her personal coach and, having arrived at her destination, told the driver to wait for her at Brignole train station (a good 5 km away) at 7 o’clock – she would spend the rest of the afternoon walking on her own, thank you very much.

Following which she proceeded to take a leisurely walk in the Grapallo gardens, now known as the Nervi Park in the eastern suburbs of Genoa.

It is the Nervi Park, walking in the footsteps of the highly strung “Sissi” (immortalized by Romy Schneider in a series of 1950s movies), to which we turn today for the last of our “three easy pieces” in the coastal landscape east of Genoa.

And since the park adjoins the Passegiata Anita Garibaldi, today’s walk in Nervi Park with Empress Sissi is easy to combine with the one we undertook for last week’s post.

So depending on how you decide to play it (whether or not you want to pay a visit to any of the Park’s various museums), you can spend anything between a few hours and a full day in Genoa’s posh eastern suburb.

The gardens feature three former properties which were gradually – starting in the 1920s – acquired by the municipal government and eventually knocked together to form a single public park.

A Walk in Nervi Park with Empress Sissi

When you take a local train from Genoa to Nervi and turn right out of Nervi station into Via Eros da Ros (which will lead you straight into the park), you will first arrive at the former property of the Marquess of Gropallo.

For a couple of centuries, this was the Gropallo family’s country residence, originally rich with olive trees and citrus orchards.

In the 19^th century, Gaetano Gropallo – an enthusiastic amateur botanist and collector of rare plants – replaced these orchards with exotic flowers …

… and palm trees, which were still a rare and unusual sight in Europe at the time.

The Gropallos were one of Genoa’s premier families and, until they sold the property in 1927, entertained many prominent guests in their residence including Gabriele d’Annunzio (the poet laureate of Italy’s fascist government) and the actress Eleonora Duse.

Carry on in an easterly direction and cross the border – nowadays invisible – into the former property of the Saluzzo family, another clan of Genoese patricians who can trace their history back to the Middle Ages.

At the top of the garden, you will see their former residence, the 17^th century Villa Serra …

… which today accommodates Genoa’s Museum of Modern Art and the European dependance of Miami’s Wolfsonian Museum. It is the Serra family – who owned the villa between 1825 and 1926 – which is generally credited for having first imported palm trees from the Canary Islands to the region.

On the far side of the road that dissects the park (Via Serra Gropaldo), you will find another country residence, formerly owned by one branch of the Grimaldi family.

The building – the oldest parts of which date back to the 16^th century – now also houses an art gallery, but for those visitors who are not interested in Italy’s equivalent of Victoriana (the gallery’s permanent collection mainly features 19^th and early 20^th century paintings), there is a rose garden …

… which will, admittedly, be a good deal more spectacular at other times of the year than in mid winter, and there are magnificent views over adjacent buildings to the Ligurian Gulf.

Finally, before you leave, you should also pay a visit to the ruins of the Genoese fortress on the eastern edge of the park.

What you see today was originally only a small part of a complex maritime defence system that was designed to ward off and to deter Saracen pirates that roamed the area throughout the Middle Ages.

When you want to combine a trip to Nervi Park with a stroll down the Passegiata Anita Garibaldi, it is best to leave the park through one of the eastern gates and turn right on Via Capolungo (which stretches along the park’s northern edge) before returning to the coast down Via Ancona.

You will soon spot the small Capolungo harbour from where you can start your walk to the main port of Nervi. Just turn right when you reach the coast, and you cannot miss it.

We are always finding hiking and walking possibilities in the Riviera for us and for you, like this pleasant walk in Nervi Park with Empress Sissi.