There’s an amusement park in a far-flung forest in Italy that may not be as big and extravagant as that of Six Flags or Disneyland, but it holds the biggest collection of homemade amusement rides. Yup, that’s right: they are homemade. And what’s more amazing is that these rides don’t need electricity to work.
Signor Bruno built the entire amusement park by himself in the municipality of Nervesa Della Battaglia, right at the center of a forest. Over the past 40 years he has developed these rides which so far compose a tumbling, swinging bridge, seesaws, gyroscopes, merry-go-rounds, contraptions and slides. Did I mention they all do not need electricity to work?
“I look at movements in nature: a branch that is moving, a bird that is flying, and then I get an idea,” Bruno told Great Big Story.
Source: Oriol Ferrer Mesià’s Flickr
People are welcome to visit his amusement park, which can be reached by a private car or bike. Another good part is that it is free.
The amusement park’s builder is barely an engineer. He is not one with formal construction training either. He is actually a restaurateur; but he got the skills to build from a blacksmith.
One time 40 years ago, he went to local blacksmith to find some basic hooks to join a chain. But the blacksmith didn’t attend to him and instead taught Bruno how to weld. That is where he learned his construction skills.
Right after that moment, he went home and constructed his own slide that became an attraction to his restaurant he has put up called the Ai Pioppi. That one ride was joined by other rides, the increasingly complex ones, as time went by, converting the restaurant into a playground as well.
Source: Atlas Obscura
