Cosenza Geography & Climate

Cosenza sits in a basin where two rivers meet, with a mountain range on each side.

Two rivers

The Crati, the longest river in Calabria, runs north through the valley and is joined here by the Busento coming down from the west. The old town occupies the wedge of high ground between them, which is a defensible site and the entire reason the city is here.

Between two ranges

West of the valley is the Catena Costiera, a narrow coastal range separating Cosenza from the Tyrrhenian about thirty kilometres away. East is the Sila.

The Sila

The Sila is a granite plateau rather than a chain of peaks, mostly between 1,200 and 1,700 metres, carrying one of the largest forests in Italy — Calabrian pine, beech, and some of the oldest trees in the country. It holds artificial lakes, wolves, and snow for months of the year. It is a national park, and it is startlingly unlike the coastal image of Calabria.

Liquorice

The coastal plain north-east of the city grows wild liquorice, and the root has been processed in Calabria since the eighteenth century. The Amarelli works at Rossano has been in the same family for that entire period and is among the oldest continuously operating businesses in Europe, with a museum attached.

Seismic and unstable

The Crati valley is a major fault system and one of the most earthquake-prone parts of Italy; the shocks of 1638, 1783 and 1905 all did severe damage here. The hillside the old town is built on is also prone to slippage, which is part of why so much of it is propped.

Cosenza has a climate shaped by sitting in a valley with mountains on both sides, and it is not the Calabria of the tourist brochures.

Summer

July and August are hot and dry, with highs regularly 33 to 35°C and occasionally higher. The valley traps heat and there is no sea breeze; the city is measurably hotter than the coast thirty kilometres away. This is why everyone who can goes up to the Sila in August.

Winter

Winter is cold by southern standards. January highs run around 11°C, frost is frequent, and the city gets occasional snow. On the Sila, half an hour away and a thousand metres higher, snow lies for months and the plateau has ski runs — a fact that surprises most visitors to Calabria.

Rain

Around 900 millimetres a year, high for the south, because the ranges on both sides wring out the weather. Autumn is genuinely wet.

Spring and autumn

The best of the year. May and June are green and warm; September and October bring the mushroom season on the Sila and clear air in the valley.

Wind and fog

The valley channels wind along its length, and autumn and winter mornings often start with fog on the river that burns off by midday. On the Sila the weather turns fast and visibility can close down within minutes, which matters more than the temperature does.

Two climates

The practical point: Cosenza and the Sila are half an hour apart and can differ by ten degrees. Pack for both.