A caver crawling through a low, muddy cave passage Under the ground

Bunker Soratte: two hours inside Mussolini's mountain

Sant'Oreste

Monte Soratte stands alone out of the Tiber plain, and it is hollow. The army dug the tunnels before the war, a German command moved in, and later the place was fitted out against the bomb.

How the day goes

  1. Book ahead: the volunteers who run it open the gate for booked visits.
  2. In through the mountainside, along the tunnels, with places to sit down on the way round.
  3. The wartime command rooms, then the part built for the atomic age.
  4. Out into Sant'Oreste, with the plain and the Tiber laid out underneath.

The story is told by the volunteers who dug the place back out, and it comes in Italian unless you arrange something else when you book.

Getting there

Getting there, the comfortable way

  • 2 honce you are there
  • Rent a car for the day

    The day stays yours: you leave when you want, stop where you want, and come back when the light goes.

    • You pick it up in Rome and drop it back in Rome
    • No timetable to build the day around
    • The stops on the way are the good part, and they need a car

    Affiliate link — you pay their price, never more, and they pay us. You book with Localrent, and anything about that booking goes through them.

    See prices on Localrent
  • Have a driver take you, door to door

    No parking to find, no wrong turns, and you leave when the day is done.

    • Picked up where you are staying, dropped back there
    • No parking to find and no ZTL to worry about
    • Nobody spends the day driving

    Affiliate link — you pay their price, never more, and they pay us. You book with Welcome Pickups, and anything about that booking goes through them.

    See prices on Welcome Pickups

Also around Sant'Oreste

A stony ridge path across open highland On the trail

Monte Soratte from Sant'Oreste

6.8 km and 691 metres of climbing, with a guide and never more than ten of you.

€49 per person

Books on Nature of Sal — Salvatore Benintende

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More under the ground

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Pastena caves

Walk into the hill on wet steps, in a guided group of no more than twelve.

€10 per person

Books on grottepastenacollepardo.it

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Cavers with kit bags in a lit cave passage Under the ground

Speleo-canyoning in a hidden cave

A trip that combines caving with canyoning progression techniques: you walk through underground chambers, cross fixed sections and rope traverses with a helmet, harness and head…

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Photograph by Kingfiser, Wikimedia Commons — CC BY-SA 4.0. Not this place: it shows what the day looks like, and will be replaced with the operator's own photograph or ours from the field.

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