Hiking La Dorsale del Triangolo Lariano

Ever since I heard about La Dorsale del Triangolo Lariano, a trail that goes from Brunate, the village at the top of the funicular above Como town, to Bellaggio, the town at the point of the triangolo that divides Lake Como into two branches at its southern end, I had wanted to hike it. And when, a couple of weeks ago, I finally did tick it off my bucket list, I wanted to add it straight back on to the bottom again.

We arrived in Milan by train, then took the Trenord service to Como from Milano Cadorna. We stocked up on picnic provisions at the little grocer on the corner between the train and the bus stations, which turned out to be a great move, as the food was excellent. After that, a quick ride on the funicular took us 500 vertical metres from the lake shore up into the mountains to the start of the trail.

Monte Boletto

You can download a detailed description of the trail here, so I'll just pick out some of the highlights. We arrived at the top of Monte Boletto, where you the first big panorama of the lake and the Dorsale ridge leading on ahead of you, just in time for lunch and a spot of lazy sunbathing. Often along the trail you have the choice between the Dorsale and the Dorsale per Cresta, which takes you over the top of the summits. Generally speaking, the time difference isn't huge and the views from the Cresta (ridge) are better, but, this being the first big hike of the season, we found walking with our 2-day backpacks quite tiring and alternated between the Cresta and the standard path.

We spent the night at the Albergo del Dosso in Pian del Tivano, which turned out to be a fantastic choice. The owners were very kind and welcoming, the rooms were comfortable, and the food (and the artisanal beer, I'm told) was fantastic. Dinner started with a buffet of salads and vegetables, then we had a choice of several pasta dishes or the local polenta speciality for the primo. Many of us chose the polenta, which was served with herbs, cheese, garlic and olive oil and was so filling that I coudn't even finish mine. Those who could manage also had a meat secondo (again there were a few options) while the rest of us opted for a delicious selection of local cheeses. For dessert, there was fresh fruit or a choice between two home-made fruit tarts. I would highly recommend Il Dosso, but just be aware that it's at the opposite end of Pian del Tivano from the Dorsale trail. We did as the pdf guide said and hiked along the road, but from the map it looked as if you could also take a different turning at Monte Croce and come out more or less at the hotel.

View from Monte San Primo

Day two started with an easy walk up a river valley, eventually leading to the ridge of Monte San Primo, where you are suddenly confronted with the most beautiful panorama of the whole trail, looking up the lake to the Swiss mountains and along down the ridge to Bellaggio. There was still a bit of snow when we were there, but it was an easy  descent, even if some sliding did go on, down into the forest.

Sentiero del Viandante

We went on from Bellaggio to Varenna, where we stayed for another day and strolled along the Sentiero del Viandante, which is also beautiful, but you can also take the ferry back from Bellagio to Como and complete the trip in 2 days.

Estate Valdostana

The Valle d'Aosta is a tiny region nestled in the north-west corner of Italy, next to the borders with France and Switzerland. Tiny in horizontal square kilometres it may be, but in its verticality it is grandiose, home to some of Europe's most impressive and beautiful mountains, including, but not limited to Gran Paradiso and the Italian sides of Monte Cervino (the Matterhorn) and Monte Bianco. It's also officially bilingual, having once been part of Savoia/Savoie/Savoy, but unlike in Italy's other bilingual region, Alto Adige/Suedtirol, whose questions of cultural and linguistic identity stem from much more recent and painful history, it carries its two languages with ease. Most of the people we met seemed to be mother-tongue Italian speakers but all were perfectly at ease in French. One old lady we met sitting outside her house in the hamlet where we were staying explained to us that, unlike most people in the area, she never learned to read and write French because she was at school at the time of Mussolini, but she could speak it fluently.

I learned to ski in the Valle d'Aosta five years ago, and I remember being awestruck as the instructor named the peaks of Europe's highest summits that were dominating the view in all directions. (Gran Paradiso is the highest mountain entirely in Italy, and as well as Mont Blanc and Monte Cervino, you can also see Monte Rosa, the highest peak in Switzerland and the second-highest in the Alps.) But if anything, I liked it even more in summer, when as well as the sweeping vistas, I could enjoy the detail of the tiny wild flowers, the stone houses with their characteristic slated roofs and the geraniums that spilled over every windowsill and flower pot. It's a story that tells itself better through photographs than words, so without further ado:

The centre of Vens, where we stayed. As well as this hotel, there was a church and some houses, and that was all.

Pretty Flowers

Roofs and mountains

Monte Bianco emerging from the clouds.

Wild Flowers

Butterflies were everywhere.

Wild Rose

Free range chicken in the town square!

Hiking up to the Lacs de Laure

Approaching the Lacs de Laure

Lac Inferieure

Waterfall

Looking across the valley from Vens.

Vens

The Lagazuoi Tunnels

The last via ferrata of my Italian trip was the easiest, but the beginning was almost as dramatic as the day before. Having decided not to take the cable car from Falzarego, we were coming to the end of what should have been an easy hike up to the top of the mountain where the via ferrata started when the voices of the gods roared, the heavens opened, and we were caught in a mighty thunderstorm. We were only about 20 minutes away from the refuge, but with the path turned into a small stream and rivulets of water streaking down the mountain, 20 minutes was plenty of time to get soaked.


It was perfect timing for the owners of the refuge, however, as we weren't the only ones that took advantage of it being lunch time to order a hot meal and dry out before making our way out across the ridge to where the via ferrata started.

It's hard to tell amongst the jagged stone of the Dolomites, but an enormous chunk of the mountain above Falzarego is missing, not because of natural erosion or disaster, but because during World War One, the Austrians were dominating the ridge from the top and the Italians were lurking lower down. Neither side was making much progress until the Italians, who had created a network of tun.nels in the mountain below, used explosives to blow away a giant section of the crest. The tunnels have now been turned into an outdoor museum and you can rent an audioguide and read information pannels as you make your way along the iron cable to the bottom.

The via ferrata was only a level 1 and we didn't use harnesses, but we were glad of our helmets, torches and fingerless gloves for holding on to the cables. Spending an hour inside a mountain in dank tunnels isn't exactly pleasant but it does give you some inkling of what life was like for the poor soldiers who carried not only all their provisions but tonnes of explosives and weaponry up the steep paths, then slept in the stone caves in inadequate clothes for the subzero winter temperatures. What is harder to understand, of course, is how these men were able to put up with such circumstances for so long, especially with the hindsight of knowing what a terrible waste the whole war turned out to be.

Via Ferrata Merlone

Monday was my second real day of via ferrata-ing and I made dramatic progress, from a scariness point of view if not a technical one. We decided to take on the Ferrata Merlone, a short, but very exposed climb in the Gruppo dei Cadini di Misurina.

We parked the car just beyond the Lago di Misurina and hiked up a trail through the forest, across a beautiful Alpine meadow filled with what seemed to be an amazing variety of flowers, given the dry desolation of the barren rocks that towered above it. From the Rifugio Fratelli Fonda-Savio it was a short walk up the Alta Via trail to the start of the via ferrata.

Iron Ladders

There is not much that requires particular skill about the Ferrata Merlone, but that can be hard to remember when you are several hundred vertical metres up a rock face, with nothing but stones, scree and thin air beneath you. Parts of the route are scrambly, but most of the climbing is actually done on iron ladders attached at a variety of angles to the mountain. I was able to avoid thinking too much about the exposure and the only part I found at all scary was what the guidebook described as an "airy traverse" - a few horizontal metres on a particularly vertical part of the cliff, with only a slippy and somewhat broken ladder for assistance.

Tre Cime di Lavaredo

We ate our sandwiches at the top and enjoyed the views across to the Tre Cime di Lavaredo, but the clouds were drawing in and we soon decided it was time to head down. Unfortunately, a group of about 20 Czechs had decided to come up at that exact moment and they made their turnaround just as we arrived at the top of the cables. With the sky growing ever-darker, we started to make our painfully slow descent in the middle of their group, but after a couple of pitches the raindrops started to fall and, with all those people in front of us, we were going nowhere fast. To top it off, they were clipping 3 people at a time into each section of the cable (you should never have more than one person in each section, otherwise if one person falls they can knock the other off) and a few of them, with clumsy feet, were frequently kicking stones down the mountain, despite the fact that other members of the group below weren't even wearing helmets.

Nobody wants to be caught on the top of a mountain in a thunderstorm, but while being attached to an iron cable is about the worst thing you can do, sitting a couple of metres away from it is actually fairly safe, as the cable will act as a lightning conductor and draw the electricity away from you. We decided that the threat from the humans was worse than the natural dangers and stepped off to the side of the cable to sit and wait.

Luckily for us, although it rained a bit, the thunder and lightning never came and after about 20 minutes we were able to make our way down to the bottom safely. We had learned our lesson though: if you see large groups of people on a via ferrata, steer well clear!

Ferrata di Dibona

On Day 2 of my via ferrata experience, I decided to lower my sights a little and attempt a level 2 ferrata, the nevertheless dramatic-sounding Ferrata di Dibona. We took the Dolomitibus from Cortina to Rio Gere, then the ski-lifts carried us up the mountain to Rifugio G. Lorenzo. The first chairlift was hi-tech and high-speed, with a storm cover and padded seats, but the second was more like the mountain equivalent of a Regionale train, so the total trip took a little while (a lot less than it would have taken us to walk, though!). Up at the refuge, it was quite cold and the wind was blowing clouds around the mountain, but luckily not in the direction we were going.

Rifugio G. Lorenzo. On the left you can just see the longest
ferrata bridge in the Dolomites.

The via ferrata starts with some steep climbing, followed by the longest bridge in the Dolomites, which, compared to the scary wire bridge on my first via ferrata, (in St-Christophe-en-Oisans in France) was reassuringly disappointing, being very solid and firmly attached to both sides of the ravine it was crossing. We did the optional climb to the Cresta Bianca, which gave us a great view down to the refuge and the way we had come.

View of the ridge from the Cresta Bianca

The Ferrata di Dibona is essentially a fabulous, exposed ridge walk. It takes the whole day but most of the trail was not difficult at all, and definitely more like hiking than rock-climbing, although there were bits that would have been a bit scary if we hadn't been clipped in to the cable. You can either come down part-way along and take a not-very-pleasant path across some scree and back to the chairlift, or you can carry on all the way to the end of the ridge and down to Ospitale, where there are buses back to Cortina. We chose the second option, which included no less than 1600m of descent but took a very pretty zigzagging path off the mountain. Most other people seemed to be taking the other route down, so we had the path more or less to ourselves and returned to the bottom with aching knees and heads full of the stunning airy views from the ridge.

Ferrata dei Alpini

Cinque Torri from Falzarego

A little-known part of the history of WW1 is the battles that were fought in the mountains of northern Italy. The Italians were defending their border with the Austro-Hungarian empire and the ridges and summits of the Dolomites became the equivalent of the trenches in northern France. It seems unbelievable that anyone could fight a war in an environment so treacherous that one insecure footing can kill a modern hiker, but they did, and more soldiers died in avalanches here than were killed by poison gas in the Somme. This was not really a front that advanced, but more a line of defence, and the only territory that was won in the long-term was when Sud Tirol was handed over to Italy and became what is now called Alto Adige. Cortina is in the largely Italian speaking part of the region but in the towns and villages to the north, people speak German and have a stronger regional than national identity.

Remains of a WW1 Hospital at Falzarego

One of the consequences of the war that remains to this day is the network of vie ferrate , or "iron ways" that crisscross the Dolomites. These were originally built to allow the soldiers to traverse the mountains and are essentially assisted rock-climbing routes made up of metal cables that you clip on to, and sometimes steps and ladders attached to the rocks. The easier parts are just exposed hiking trails but the harder ones require real rock-climbing skills.

You can hire the climbing kit at the outdoor shops in Cortina for around 12 euros per day. As I had done one fairly scary via ferrata once before, as well as a (very small) amount of rock climbing, we decided on the first day to tackle a grade 3 route (out of 5), the Ferrata dei Alpini at Falzarego.

I was somewhat daunted by the vertical-ness of the cliff that confronted me at the beginning, but, knowing that rock-climbing is often easier than it looks, I clipped in and got started. Unfortunately, about 3 stages in, there was a point where I needed to step across ... or up ... or even just round a big lump of jutting out rock. And I tried, in every possible direction, with every possible body part, but I didn't yet have the balance in my legs or the strength in my arms and I just couldn't do it.

A little disappointed, I climbed back down and resigned myself to taking the walking path to the top of the route, admiring the view and taking pictures of all the pretty flowers along the way. And when my brother and his wife arrived at the top and confirmed that the rest of the climb was just as difficult (and much harder than the other grade 3s they had tried), I didn't regret my decision at all. Tomorrow, after all, would be another day.

Alta Via dei Monti Lariani

On Monday, I learned my lesson from Sunday and took the C13 bus 750m up the mountains to the village of Breglia to start my second hike. I was planning to go up to the Rifugio Menaggio, our over-ambitious goal from the day before, and continue on to Monte Grona and beyond, but when I got to the fork in the path leading to the refuge, I decided that "beyond" would be more exciting and set off along the ridge, following the Alta Via dei Monti Lariani.

The one flaw in my plan was that I had meant to fill up my water bottle at the refuge and, by bypassing the highest tap on the mountain, I left myself with limited supplies, which, given that the temperature down in the valley was about 30 degrees, was not very clever. I knew there were some water fountains on the way down, so I decided that I would carry on for as long as my water lasted and turn back as soon as I had drunk the last mouthful. Luckily, this turned out to be the summit of Monte Bregagno, which was about as far as I wanted to go anyway, especially as I had a bus to catch.

As well as having stunning views, the ridge was actually pleasantly cool and I enjoyed myself hugely, stopping for lunch and to admire the views of Monte Grona and Lake Lugano at Sant'Amate before carrying on the the highest point at Monte Bregagno.

It was only as I strode back down the mountain in search of water and the bus, with the temperature seeming to increase by several degrees with every step I took, that I realised how hot the weather actually was. I finished the day with a well-earned gelato from the shop on the main piazza in Menaggio (great ice-cream but very grumpy service!) and a dive into the lake to cook down.

Barna and the Valle della Senagra

Varenna from the Ferry

After a Saturday evening of catching up with friends in Milan over some good old spritz Aperol aperitivo and mispronounced cocktails, my friend and I dragged ourselves out of bed early on Sunday morning to head up to Lake Como for some hiking. I was staying at the hostel La Primula in Menaggio, so we caught the train to Varenna (using a free weekend ticket that they've been handing out at the stations recently!), then the boat across the lake. and I was able to drop my suitcase off before we set out on our hike. The Menaggio tourist office publishes a booklet of walks in the area, but many of them require you to take a bus to the starting point and buses on a Sunday are few and far between, so using a hiking map which I had (luckily!) bought in Milan a while back, we combined a couple of their itineraries to make a route of our own, starting at the town centre and aiming for the Rifugio, which was a somewhat optimistic 1400m above the town.

We didn't make it all the way up, mostly because my friend had to get back to Milan that night to go to work on Monday, and in the end it turned out to be a good thing because an enormous thunderstorm began roaring soon after we had turned back and the storm clouds chased us right back down the valley. We did have a good day out though, and saw some interesting sights:

Scary Rock Face in the Valle della Sanagra

I wasn't planning to!

Dinky little Fiat

Barna

Monte Grona

Barometer. The text reads, "If the cord is dry, it's nice weather; if the cord is wet, it's raining; if the cord is stiff, it's cold; if you can't see the cord, it's foggy; if the cord is moving, it's windy and if there is no cord, it's been stolen!

Storm Clouds over Lake Como

What I Love About Italy Is...(#2)

...Autumn in the mountains. The trees turning yellow and brown against the blue sky. The smell of the fallen leaves. The dramatic silhouettes of the mountains against the bright sunlight. The pretty stone paths. Eating amazing food on the terrance of a rifugio. Drinking wine at lunch time. Sunbathing in October. Good company. Waterfalls. Shiny chestnuts. Weird rock formations high, high up in the sky...

...signs that tell you exactly where lunch is coming from...

On days like this, I think I could stay in Italy forever.

On a Mountain High

After my tranquil day recovering from the cold on Saturday, Sunday was the day of my big adventure. I joined a mountaineering club a couple of weeks after I got here and I'd been looking forward to the first trip ever since. We climbed the Cima della Crocetta, which is in the Gran Paradiso park in Piemonte, about 2.5 hours drive from Milan.

The club is organised differently from the ones I know at home. People meet at set points across the city to get on a full size coach and everybody does the same walk, which is usually organised by two people. While that makes it difficult to enjoy the vast solitude of the mountains, for me it was really nice because I got to meet lots of new people, all of whom were friendly and most of whom were men with names beginning with L (seriously: I met 2 Lucas, 2 Lorenzos and either a Luigi or a Ludovico, I can't remember). It also really reminded me how great it is to be able to speak Italian living here: although there were a couple of people who could have chatted in English if I had needed them to, it was much, much easier to get to know people and feel like one of the group. Without understanding Italian, I doubt I would even have got past the website to signing up for the group!

The walk itself was pretty tough. We climbed about 1250 very steep metres and, although we only really stopped for lunch and one break, it took about 8 hours. I felt really tired and a bit dizzy towards the top, but I think it was because it was about 2 o'clock in the afternoon and I had hardly eaten anything since breakfast at 5. I thought I would feel really stiff today, but in fact I was fine, so I can't be as unfit as I thought I was!

And apart from that, I think the pictures tell the story better than words can!