We stayed in Cortina d'Ampezzo to go hiking in the spectacular Dolomites with a particular interest in the extensive remains from the First World War.
We flew into Venice and drove up to Cortina d'Ampezzo. The motorway just outside Cortina was closed because of a landslide so we had to go via a longer, but more scenic, route through the mountains via Auronzo.
We stayed in the Grand Hotel Savoia in Cortina, a beautiful hotel and we had a gorgeous corner room with mountain views on both sides.
Cortina is a pure resort town, a pleasant enough place to stay. We had good meals at the hotel restaurant, I particularly enjoyed the Ampezzana, a local mountain dish of potatoes and bacon and we both enjoyed the Amarone! ll Vizietto in the town wasn't bad.
Cortina is the place to stay in this part of the Dolomites for skiing in winter and walking in the mountains in summer which was why we were here in July. In particular we wanted to explore the remnants of the First World War sites which can be found in numerous places.
Just outside the town to the west is the military cemetery - the Sacrario Militare di Pocol. It's a rather grim tower.
Outside are a number of different types of cannon.
The remains of thousands of the fallen are interred inside.
Sass di Stria Cinque Torri Forcella Zumeles Lagazuoi Passo Giau
This hike starts with a steep scramble from the Forte Tre Sassi near the Falzarego Pass, a solid stone building from the Austro-Hungarian Empire days built to guard the pass.1
We soon came to remnants of steps cut into the mountainside, shored up with timber boards.
The Italian and Austrian armies fought here during the First World War. When the Italian artillery severely damaged Forte Tre Sassi the Austrians moved higher into the Dolomites. Both sides then proceeded to build tunnels in an attempt to attack the enemy from below with explosives.
Apart from the historical interest, the views are spectacular.
The route was very rubbly and quite difficult, especially coming down. When we got back to the bottom there was a rescue helicopter there. We discovered later that a woman had fallen and broken her leg and her husband fell trying to reach her. Very easy to do on this difficult terrain.
We had a good deal of trouble parking the car at the bottom of the chair lift, managing just to squeeze it on to the end of a row. At the top of the chair lift we had a sausage sandwich from the cafe before setting out to explore the First World War remains.
There are lots of trenches here from the Austrian-Italian front plus machine gun and look-out posts. The added bonus is the magnificent scenery of fabulous mountain peaks.
Everything has been restored and looks pristine.
An early start for the Rio Gere chair lift on a glorious morning.
The scenery is again spectacular and it's a relatively easy hike to Forcella Zumeles where Val Padeon stretches far below between the mountain ranges.
The route down is much more difficult, rubbly and very steep to begin with, then through a forest where the track was all exposed tree roots so you constantly have to watch your feet. Then there is a river gorge to cross, steep down and up with little to hold on to and washed-away steps, really quite dangerous. Easier after this, crossing a meadow, but the route markers were confused then disappeared altogether. We made our way to the bottom as best we could and came out near a restaurant where we had some welcome food: venison ravioli for Andrew and mushroom tagliatelle for me, washed down with a glass of house red and more water. As we were driving back I spotted a signpost further down the road below the restaurant where the track actually comes out.
A cable car up a sheer rock face then a very easy walk along a ridge to Piccolo Lagazuoi. Fantastic 360° views of the mountains and more First World War trenches etc.
The mountain is riddled with tunnels leading to machine gun and look-out posts.
At this point I'd really had enough of scrambling down dangerous rubbly mountainsides so we took the cable car back down.
We had planned to do a hike from Rifugio Averau one afternoon so drove to Rifugio Fedare to take the cable car. The cable car wasn't running though, so we had lunch at Rifugio Fedare - excellent fried eggs, bacon and fried potatoes and a carafe of red - before going to Passo Giua, which was on our way back to Cortina anyway, and walked to the top before returning to the hotel as the weather looked like it was turning.
