There are places that are just simply charming! Always! It had been many years since I had stood in the doorway of the “Public Wash Houses” of Rio nell’Elba, and when I did, I could hear distinctively the sound of water spouting from its 16^th century brass mouths. So, I closed my eyes, like I did when I was a little girl when my grandmother Filomena told me the stories of so many women whose life represents the ‘historic memory’ of this place, which used to be the symbol of socialization. Women with a “pezzola”, a kerchief to cover their head, or with their hair pulled back in a bun, who worked so hard for years over the granite slabs of the tubs with their tired feet and wrinkled hands, washing and wringing out the clothing of their children, their brothers or husbands, almost all of whom were strong and proud miners who had extracted the rich iron minerals from their native soil. In this place with an ancient atmosphere, a suggestive civil wedding was celebrated that saw the active participation of not only the parents and friends of the bride and groom Alessandro e Laila, but also of the community of Rio, whose people are known as being tenacious and hard working. To organize the crowning of their idyllic love on such an important ‘stage’ was, once more, an occasion to “dive” into the past. In the verdant and water rich town of Rio nell’Elba nestled on a hill that towers “The Valley of the Mills”, I once again tasted the authentic flavor of an ancient hamlet and soon rediscovered the unique and rare warm generosity of the townspeople. I breathed in the perfumes and the colors of its vegetation and listened once again to its “music”: the roosters crow echoing through the valley at dawn, a babbling brook, the constant gurgling of the water rising from the Canali fountain and, for those who knew him, the noisy cries of Ciccillo, the fisherman who came every day from Porto Azzurro to sell his fish, making the town a joyful place.