Ecomuseo Regionale delle Miniere e della Val Germanasca

The Ecomuseum is located about 70 km northwest of Turin.
The special feature that makes the Ecomuseum's Welcome Centre a 'site of excellence' is the presence of the two mines 'Paola' and 'Gianna', which, with over 4 km of tunnels set up and equipped, have made it possible to create two internationally unique visitor routes called ScopriMiniera and ScopriAlpi respectively.
The first, 'ScoprMiniera', set up inside the Paola mine, allows visitors to enter the gallery on board the miners' little train and continue on foot to discover the sites where the famous White of the Alps was extracted: the world's most prized talcum powder.
"Instead, 'ScopriAlpi' offers us an amazing adventure, a spectacular journey through space and time to discover the formation of the Alps.
In the spaces adjacent to the entrance to the galleries there is a permanent exhibition space presenting the territory and landscape of the valley, Waldensian history, the Occitan language and the social and rural life of the farmer-miner. The figure of the peasant-miner is in fact at the heart of the activities carried out by the ecomuseum, which include numerous proposals: nature and geological excursions, ancient mining sites, air-raid shelters, mills still in activity, ethnographic-historical museums and museums on Waldensian culture.
An important feature of the Eco-museum is in fact the fact that the Germanasca Valley has not only a well-organised network of tourist and cultural resources (museums, mills, hydroelectric power stations, mines, paths) but also the possibility of presenting a living, present reality in which the activities of the past are still existing or well documented.
The Ecomuseum thus expresses the will of the people of this territory to bear witness to their identity by promoting knowledge and interpretation of the signs still present.