Tuscany's Wild Side

Forget vineyards, cypress trees, and Renaissance towns-a new, environmentally conscious lodge offers a more rugged take on the much-loved region.

- Sarah Moss

MY SON FELIX and I slept with the windows open, so I was woken by birdsong. The sun was just coming over the mountain, the wooded hills were flooded with golden light, and the land was alive with insects and birds. While Felix continued to doze, I stepped onto the veranda, breathed in the scent of pine trees and herbs and flowers, and saluted the sun.

We were staying at Oasyhotel, an eco-resort at the Oasi Dynamo nature reserve, in Italy's Pistoia Mountains. We had driven from the Pisa airport, winding through Tuscan valleys where stucco farms and villages perched on the mountainsides.

Grandmothers sunned themselves behind geraniums on wrought-iron balconies. We reached a stone gateway and parked our car. A driver then took us five miles up a winding track to the top of a hill, where cooling winds stirred the trees. Crickets sang. It felt like the first time in months that we'd been unable to hear traffic.

Oasy is made up of 16 wooden lodges, as well as old stone farm buildings that have been converted into two restaurants, a bar, and a reception area. The lodges are simple and prefabricated-no permanent new structures are allowed in the nature reserve but well designed and positioned to make the most of mountain views.

The resort sits on nearly 2,500 acres of land that was once the hunting estate of the owners of Società Metallurgica Italiana, a bullet factory in the nearby village of Campo Tizzoro. It has been rewilded and conserved in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund. The estate's park and gardens are also home to Dynamo Camp, an impressive recreational-therapy program for children with disabilities and critical illnesses that includes the first wheelchair-accessible adventure playground in Europe.