Giuseppina Bardelli is more than just an extremely Italian-sounding name. It’s the extremely Italian-sounding name of an 89-year-old Italian woman who miraculously survived for days in the Italian Alps after getting lost while mushroom hunting.
On August 21, 2024, Bardelli and her 57-year-old son Sergio trekked through the woods by Lake Maggiore. They got separated, and the elder Bardelli fell down the slope into a gully. She broke some ribs and perforated a lung.
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The search party went all out looking for her. Firefighters. Drones. Search dogs. After four days, the search party was about ready to call it quits. That’s when they found her.
When they asked Bardelli how she survived the ordeal, she said she drank rainwater from puddles, made a bed out of ferns, and formed a strong emotional bond with a fox that visited her several times during her adventure.
Bardelli was found in a lucid state, at least lucid enough to joke, “Now you’re trying to kill me,” when one of the rescuers tried to put a neck brace on her. She was taken to the hospital, where she is currently recovering from her injuries.
No word yet on whether it was a sassy cartoon fox or more like a sage vision quest kind.
