Pescantina

The district of Pescantina is 13 kilometres apart from Verona and it includes the community of Arcè, Balconi, Ospedaletto, Santa Lucia and Settimo. There are numerous testimonies from the Roman era, while the area lacks of testimonies from prehistoric times. Some Roman examples are the Latin inscriptions, the lid of a sarcophagus with hunting scenes, an altar with winged putti, sacrificial instruments and a military fragment known as "military of Arbizzano". In the Middle Ages the area was characterized by a succession of influences and conflicts, up to the Serenissima dominion, which led to a period of social tranquility.

The church of San Lorenzo is a work of the eighteenth century, in the neoclassical - baroque style. In 1145 the chapel depends on San Floriano and in 1450 became Pieve, and then became parish in 1600. Its present form is due to a design by Alessandro Pompei made in 1753. The interior is decorated with many of the eighteenth century paintings. The bell tower is over 80 meters high and was built in the first half of 1800, following the drawing made by Giuseppe Barbieri.

The Ethnographic Museum of Pescantina, called "Work and traditions along the Adige River," contains objects and original documents, photographs, scale models and it is set up in the parish church of San Lorenzo. The Museum presents the proof of a world linked to the Adige river, now disappeared due to the local economy changes.

Villa Quaranta is located in the hamlet of Ospedaletto. It was built in the mid-seventeenth century and it is situated in a beautiful Italian garden. The villa has two levels and an architecture with clean lines. At the main floor, there is a central loggia with three arches. The inner walls of the villa are decorated with murals. A marmoreal staircase leads to the top floor, where there is a Loggia dell'Angelo, offering a magnificent view over the park, and the Salone delle Arti, frescoed with rural motifs.

Villa Bertoldi, in the village of Settimo, dates back to 1600 and preserves characteristic structure of Venetian Villas, with a large garden. The inner staircase and the wide entrance hall are decorated with four large canvases with landscapes of Andrea Porta. Opposite the Chapel, dedicated to Saint Anthony, there is a shrine dedicated to our Lady of Sorrows.  Important is the library of the villa, which houses rare volumes from the 17th and 18th centuries.

The monument to former inmates is a work of the architect Mirko Vucetich, built in 1966 at the train station of Balconi. It is a monument to remember the fallen in Nazi concentration camps and all veterans, who were welcomed and accommodated in the territory after the Second World War. The monument consists of a stone staircase, five steps, which bring the visitor to the tangle of barbed wire and imploring hands on both sides of the building. In the middle, it is placed a high cross, of barbed wire, with a base of red marble from Verona. At the side of the monument, it was sited a railway car, with photographs and documents on re-entry in Italy of the deported after imprisonment in concentration camps.