Mt. Calvario / Podgora

Along the two kilometres uphill leading to the summit of Mt. Calvario, if you look carefully through the vegetation, you will be able to spot some trenches dug by soldiers during the war. The most visible is the one on the dirt road right on the top, excavated by the 24th Diggers Division after August 1916.
Park your car in the esplanade and walk for 5 minutes to the Memorial stone dedicated to the Julian volunteers who fell on this hilltop. The four sides of the stone are engraved with the names of these Italian soldiers, who were considered traitors by the Austro-Hungarians and were killed in 1915 during an assault against the Habsburg defence lines.

If you continue driving, after a few minutes you will reach the Obelisk of Mt. Calvario, preceded by five stones dedicated to the volunteers from Trentino, the Casale and Pavia Brigades, two battalions of Carabinieri and the Julian Volunteers who lost their lives on the Karst. The Obelisk was built in1920 with stones extracted from local quarries and is located at the end of a small stairway. Each side of the base bears the inscriptions commemorating the tragic fate of the several units and divisions who tried to conquer Mt. Calvario during the first year and a half of war.

Behind this monument, a trail shaded by trees leads to the actual summit of Mt. Calvario in about 5 minutes, from where you can enjoy wonderful views of the town. Here, you can also see the Three Crosses representing the Golgotha during the Calvary. Austrian war reporter Alice Schalek wrote that a church with three crosses on the outside had been built here before the war. It was later destroyed by the Italian bombing and its remains were incorporated in the Austro-Hungarian entrenched system. The main building was never rebuilt, while the Three Crosses were relocated after the end of the Great War.