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A rural town on the Impero River, Chiusavecchia belonged to the bishops of Albenga and later to the Doria family and the House of Savoy, like all of the territory around Monte Arosio in the upper Oneglia Valley. It is a valley municipality situated on a wide and important road between the coast and Piedmont. The name Chiusavecchia derives from "chiusa", the Byzantine bulwark (lying on an axis with Chiusanico) that was breached by the Lombards in the seventh century. The occupation by Germanic races is witnessed by the names of places lying closest to the sea: Sarola (from the German "sala", meaning "master's house") and Gazzelli (from "gahagi", meaning "private terrain").

Vineyards, and especially olive trees, have been an important feature of the landscape for centuries in Chiusavecchia, where the ancient olive presses are still working today. Even a sanctuary has been dedicated to the olive, the Madonna dell'Oliveto, which was built in 1564 but restructured down the centuries. Besides the elegant Baroque bell tower and the organ built by Maestro Agati, there is a splendid pebbled parvis outside the church with traditional "rissoi" designs. The view from the sanctuary takes in the entire Chiusavecchia plain as far as the sea.

The parish church of San Biagio and San Francesco di Sales belongs to the Baroque period and has a curious bulb-shaped bell tower. Some fine restoration work on the interior has managed to save a wooden crucifix sculpted by an anonymous craftsman around the fifteenth-sixteenth centuries. The bridge across the Impero goes back to the late Middle Ages. The churches in the districts of Sarola and Olivastri are from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries respectively. Some roads leading out of Chiusavecchia take you through the oak woods and olive groves up to Monte Acquarone (732 m.) and to the towns of Lucinasco, Chiusanico and Torria.

Lucinasco decided to stop the clock at the time when the only resources were those of the land and when olive cultivation was a year-round occupation. Favoured by the position of the town, on the ridge between the upper and lower Impero Valley, olive-growing is still the pride of this ancient Roman landed estate. This can be seen during the olive-harvest, which is truly a ritual here: Lucinasco is perhaps the only place in Liguria where olives are still picked by hand, without the use of any instruments. This is why the Liguria Regional Council has chosen this little town with a view over the Alps and the sea as the most appropriate area for the promotion of superior-quality olive oil and the creation of an olive-growing exhibition area.

The cultural and everyday life of Lucinasco, which was a feudal estate of the Ventimiglia aristocracy, can be seen in a museum bearing the name of Lazzaro Acquarone (who was born here), which is situated in the Oratorio dei Disciplinati di San Giovanni Battista. It comprises two sections: one is dedicated to an ethnographic collection of traditional manufacturing activities, while the other is dedicated to "countryside dwellings", with a collection of everyday household objects, and religious art, with paintings and sculptures from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

You can continue your cultural visit by seeing the Romanesque church of the Maddalena, a national monument, and the mediaeval parish church of Santo Stefano, hidden away in the middle of a splendid park containing waterfalls and a lake. It is not a very difficult walk if you wish to go through Pantasina and climb up Colle d'Aggia. A slightly longer excursion takes you to Monte Acquarone and the Maddalena woodland. In July, Lucinasco holds the octopus festival. You can practise clay-pigeon shooting from June to September.