The weather was again very nice despite a forecast for rain, so whilst we enjoyed our breakfast with lovely meadow and mountain views we debated what we would do today. We would have loved to redo the last 1.5hrs of travel from yesterday when we didnt have time to stop in our rush home for dinner, but thought an easier day going up the Alpi di Siusi and checking out the meadow would be in order. If we had time to spare, then we would head out to Lake Braies which is about 1.5hrs drive.
The Alpi Siusi is Europes highest meadow, set on a plateau under the Scilla Massive it is approximately 6,000 hectares. There are a few settlements up there, typical Swiss style dark brown timbered houses and small herds of cows with bells clonking constantly, ugly small goats, and large white sheep. This time of year it is a paradise for hikers and nature lovers with great weather, lifts and gondola up to high points, many types of wildflowers and fantastic views over the valleys and Dolomites. In winter there are many ski slopes for the snow bunnies.
It is an easy 15 minutes drive from home base, and instead of parking at the bottom and taking a cable car up we took a slightly wrong turn and drove up to the meadow itself. The road was very good and scenic, taking only about 5 minutes to reach our parking place at 1,850m. Parking was expensive – you had one option 17 euro for the whole day. Nevermind, from there we walked about 800m down hill to a gondola which would take us up to 2,174m to Mount Puflatsch or Bullaccia. Up the top is a restaurant and separate viewing area where you can see the Dolomites. There are are a lot of different gondola and ski lifts up there depending on what you want to do – but we chose this particular one as it was recommended as the best panorama view point and a good starting point for lots of hikes.
After our rotten luck in Chamonix and Luzern we were thankful for a second day of really good visual clarity and spent a good hour enjoying the view, taking photos and getting up close with the small alpine meadow flowers. I had taken a hay fever pill just in case the flowers triggered my sinus – and thankfully I was all good. There was a lovely array of flowers – I will let photos do the talking but most interesting was this tiny deep ocean blue one. You had to be careful walking around off the tracks as many are so tiny it would be easy to crush them. You also could miss them if you walked to quickly – just standing or sitting you would see some tiny wee little bit of colour or different foliage popping up around rocks or in the greener meadow parts. At one part when I emerged from behind the camera and onto my feet a passer by commented how cute I looked amongst the flowers! LOL Fernando the Bull does it again (childrens story about a bull that didn’t want to fight, instead sit in the meadow and smell flowers).
All this was hungry work, so we made our way to the restaurant where we were served by happy waitresses dressed in dirndle and shared a tasting platter of Klose – German semolina dumplings for 23 euro and a cup of tea and coffee. As pictured – that was one heck of a dumpling plate and we felt almost guilty that we had not either walked up the mountain or had planned to walk down. We did our best, but had to keep in mind that we had a five course dinner in about 5 hours and that is no mean feat to get through with Gabrielle’s portions either. The dumplings each with its own condiment or sauce were delicious by the way and vegetarian; Pine nut with mushroom and brown butter, Cheese with garlic butter spinach and Parmesan, Spinach with horseradish sauce and Parmesan, Buckwheat with German kraut (blanced coleslaw with caraway and speck) salat and Parmesan cheese, and Beetroot on green salad with butter and Parmesan. Nom Nom, and we feel fattened.
Up that high means you go a bit slower, but its not too bad like at around 4,000m. I surprised myself at my ability to get up and down so many times, laying on the ground face to face with the small flowers. That being said, relaxing in the thin air and warm sun (25 up the top, 30 lower down) made us feel a bit tired. I think the crazy day of overloaded experience yesterday would have contributed. On the way down, we had to walk up hill for 800m, and with a full belly I can tell you it was hard going. About three stops to get a bit more air, and off we went. It wasn’t just us – most others were pausing on the way up, Norwegian mountain walking poles and all.
As we had missed our turn on the way up we purchased gondola tickets that would take us on a return trip down the other big hill/mountain side. It was pleasant to view the valley in relative quiet, hearing the cow bells below and giving Vern a chance to view the impressive Scilla massive without being behind the wheel and trying to keep us on the road. On the way home we stopped off in Castlerotto to have a look around and get a few supplies for tomorrow’s train trip to Venice. It is an attractive well equipt town, with its old sector and the tallest onion topped church tower in the region. It was rebuilt in the 1700’s after a fire pretty much ruined the original. There was a nice church next to it, with an interesting statue of the Madonna with a sword through her heart underneath Jesus on a cross. Never seen one quite like that before.
On the way home we even got to see a pretty cool lightening show as a thunder storm passed through they valley. Dinner again was so good, and incredible value for money.
Travels with Valrock 