Every so often, a car cautiously serpentines down the winding hillside road away from the ancient hamlet of Ofena, in Italy's Abruzzo region. It's not the sort of drive you rush: Every downward curve opens onto yet another vista of superabundant grandeur.

The views here in the Gran Sasso e Monti della Laga National Park are of such unrelenting picturesqueness it seems only right that the roadside benches are turned away from the landscape, toward Ofena's unprepossessing buildings. The locals sitting there appear relieved to be resting their eyes from the ceaselessly breathtaking Apennine postcard unfurling behind them.

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Source: http://www.saveur.com/