Fonni is the highest town in Sardinia.  Beautiful setting.  There is even skiing nearby.  And if you enjoy art – particularly Trompe l’Oeil murals, this is a mini-paradise.  Dozens of murals decorate a wall around every corner as you wander the steep streets.  I highly recommend this as an stop for this reason alone.

As I arrived during off-season, I had but one choice for hotel.  It was nice, but I might have to question the knowledge of the staff – explanation ensues….

I planned to depart for the East coast on a Sunday.  I carefully asked the concierge if buses ran on Sunday and which stop I needed.  I arrived at the stop dutifully and waited, and waited,  Hmmm, 15 minutes past scheduled arrival time and no bus.  No biggie, this kind of thing is common here, right?  I took it in stride and waited for the next schedule bus – and the next – for a total of about 4 hours.  I asked every passerby if this was the correct stop and if buses ran today.  “Si” accompanied by a reassuring nod was always the reply :\

It seems that even though this is a dinky little town, it is situated on a slope not very conducive to walking around apparently.  So, seemingly the entire town decided to hop in their cars and “cruise”.  All day.  Fortunately for me, my bus stop was at a key intersection, so I got to know just about every face in town intimately after viewing the quizzical look displayed by each about 50 times.  The steady stream of exhaust was quite a pleasure as well.

I eventually gave up and checked back into my hotel.  The staff was stumped as to why the bus didn’t arrive.  The next morning after checkout, I decided to find a different place to buy a bus ticket and ask them about the schedule – surely they would know.  “Oh no, the buses don’t run on Sunday this time of year”.  No kidding.  After triple-checking the stop and time, I eventually caught a bus out of town…

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(15 Photos)

Oristano was my re-entry to city life after wandering the West coast of Sardinia for nearly a week.  While not anything to go out of your way for, Oristano was a nice place to stroll around for an afternoon and evening – particularly the city center (as is usually the case).

Medieval times saw the most action here as this city waged war with other Sardinian powers for control of the island.  The pictured statue next to city hall honors Eleanor of Arborea, known for her promulgation of the Carta di Logu – the legal code of the Arborea region that stood from 1392 until 1827.  Today, Oristano is a relatively sleepy town with some interesting shops that I’m not sure “Tigger” would be too fond of.

References:

Oristano

Nestled among the rolling hills below the Sciliar Massif lies the historic Castello Presule.  The walk is fairly leisurely, winding through the farms and vineyards on the hillsides, affording great views of the surrounding mountains.

As peaceful as it seems, the castle itself was apparently the site of many a witch-burning in the early 1500’s – at least 9 women from Fie were burned here.  Now it offers guided tours and concerts.  I took the tour solo as no other tourists were there and my guide only spoke German and Italian.  However, she lent me a little document written in English pointing out the major attractions, so while we didn’t have much conversation, the tour was good

References:

Shorter Walks in the Dolomites

The Latemar group derives it’s name from an old Ladin (no, not Latin) description “cresta de Lac-te-mara” which roughly means “mountain ridge over the lake in a cirque”.  Ladin is an old romance language actually still spoken today by some 18,000 people as their first language.

The cirque is a lake that lies beneath Latemar is Lago di Carezza and comes with a story of it’s own (from the wooden sign by the lake):

THE MERMAID OF LAKE CAREZZA
Many years ago, the lake Carezza was the home of a beautiful mermaid. One day, the wizard of Masare listened to her singing and, immediately, fell in love with her. He used all his power to win the mermaid’s heart but she would not relent. Therefore, the wizard asked the witch Langwerda for help. Langwerda advised him to dress as a jeweler and to create a rainbow running from the Catinaccio to the Latemar.
Then, he should go back to Lake Carezza, entice the mermaid and kidnap her. The wizard followed the witch’s advice but forgot to disguise himself. The mermaid admired the colourful rainbow and the glittering gems but realized very quickly that the wizard was near and dived into Lake Carezza. Since then, she has never been seen again. Being lovesick, the wizard destroyed the rainbow, shattered it into pieces and threw all its parts into the lake, together with the gemstones. For this reason, Lake Carezza still shimmers to this day in all the wonderful colors of the rainbow.

Lago di Carezza was very full the day I arrived, with most of its surrounding path underwater.  I made my way around the lake and headed up towards the base of Latemar.  The path I took was through an area called “Labarinto” (labyrinth) that runs below the North face.  Agatha Christie once visited this area, and set the end of her thriller The Big Four on this route.  I found a great place to have a little picnic and admire the spires and rockslides.  This is a great place for a relatively easy day of hiking – not to be missed!

References:

The Latemar Massif
Shorter Walks in the Dolomites

There’s a chance that you may be thinking that each new place I visit in Italy is my new favorite. Be that as it may, now that I have actually left Italy, I have an official ruling. If I was allowed to only return to only one place in Italy for the rest of my life, it would no doubt be the Dolomites (followed extremely closely by Sardegna and the Northern Lakes, respectively). I have never seen such amazing mountains – and that’s saying a lot from a native Colorado boy who has spent a good chunk of his life wandering around the Rocky Mountains. Much of the draw for me is likely intangible – maybe it’s a certain combination of the rugged massiveness of the peaks and the way the light moves across the vast expanses of rock. Regardless, this place undoubtedly stirs something within me.

The Seiser Alm (Alpe di Siusi in Italian) is the largest alpine meadow in Europe. This amazing place has unlimited views of the Dolomites and Austrian Alps and is well-known for great hiking and skiing. I am finding that a piece of me is still there, stunned and hypnotized by that vast peacefulness and unexpected beauty. A return is inevitable.

There’s a chance that you may be thinking that each new place I visit in Italy is my new favorite. Be that as it may, now that I have actually left Italy, I have an official ruling. If I was allowed to only return to only one place in Italy for the rest of my life, it would no doubt be the Dolomites (followed extremely closely by Sardegna and the Northern Lakes, respectively). I have never seen such amazing mountains – and that’s saying a lot from a native Colorado boy who has spent a good chunk of his life wandering around the Rocky Mountains. Much of the draw for me is likely intangible – maybe it’s a certain combination of the rugged massiveness of the peaks and the way the light moves across the vast expanses of rock. Regardless, this place undoubtedly stirs something within me.

The Seiser Alm (Alpe di Siusi in Italian) is the largest alpine meadow in Europe. This amazing place has unlimited views of the Dolomites and Austrian Alps and is well-known for great hiking and skiing. I am finding that a piece of me is still there, stunned and hypnotized by that vast peacefulness and unexpected beauty. A return is inevitable.

Lago d’Orta is about 40 minutes, as the bus rides, southwest of Lago Maggiore.  The primary attractions are the town of Orta itself and Isola di San Giulio nearby.  I arrived at the Northern end of the lake and took a boat down to Orta.  This port town has some beautiful old buildings and some interesting modern art on display, but I quickly grew tired of the shopping crowds and headed up the hill to the uncrowded Sacro Monte.  Here on the large, beautifully landscaped grounds was an interesting collection of churches, monuments, and other buildings.  One of the more interesting things to me was scenes from biblical stories depicted with life-size sculpted characters – very beautiful work.  Overall a very peaceful place to wander around and of course rich with photo opportunities!  I think I would spend a lot of time up here if I lived here.  It’s bit hard to describe, but I just had a certain subtle feeling of home or déjà vu here – a touch of familiarity and comfort that just washed over me at times.

Last, but not least, Isola di San Giulio is home to a monastery and Basilica di San Giulio, among other historical buildings.  I ended up not actually taking a boat out to the island as I found it more interesting viewed from Orta or from the water (my boat went by it on the way back).

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(13 Photos)

One of my favorite day trips from Verbania was a large loop via train.  Starting in Verbania, I headed to Domodossola where I switched to the oddly named Swiss “FART” train.  A new alternative fuel?  No, this Swiss transportation system acronym actually stands for Ferrovie Autolinee Regionali Ticinesi.  They must have a crack team in the acronym department there   This train then runs through beautiful Valle Vigezzo to Locarno, Switzerland on the northern shores of Lago Maggiore.

Along the way, I got off the train at Druogno and spent 3 hours hiking up the closest mountain I could find, Alpe Cima.  The vegetation here is very dense, but I managed some pretty nice views when I reached the top.  The view from the train is also quite nice, but nothing like what can be attained via hiking, so I’m glad I went.  The towns of Druogno and Santa Maria Maggiore are also very nice little mountain towns to explore.

After visiting Stresa and Lago Maggiore earlier in my travels, I decided to return for an extended stay to explore the surrounding area.  Via friends-of-friends-of-friends-uncle’s-sister’s-dog’s-master kind of connection, I rented a room from a family in Verbania for a couple of weeks.  The family was wonderful and it was a nice break to stay in one place for a little while and get to know people a little better (and enjoy some home-cooked Italian meals!).  I even got to try climbing on an indoor climbing wall (lots of fun, I can see how one can get hooked on this).  Thanks for everything Elena, Giobi, Garcia, Giulia, Loretta and Daniello (sp?)!

I need to take a moment to brag a bit about these people I had the honor to get to know .  Garcia is quite the climber and built an indoor climbing wall with a group of other climbers.  He and his girlfriend Giulia are also very talented musicians and play cello/sing for weddings and other events.  Garcia not only plays cello, but hand-made the cello he plays!  He also makes and repairs violins.  Giobi is a self-taught web designer (giobi.com) and guitarist.  And of course Elena is moving to California this summer to earn her PhD in Chemistry.  Yeah, you guys rock

Ok, back to travel stuff (it almost seems boring now ).  The Lago Maggiore shoreline is dotted with many intriguing little towns that can be reached by bus or boat.  Cannobio was a particularly nice place, decorated by a port with great views.  It is also a popular area for windsurfing and kitesurfing and conditions happened to be perfect the day I was there, so I got to watch all the extreme sports fanatics.

In Verbania Part II: Valle Vigezzo, I take a train from Domodossola,Italy to Locarno, Switzerland.  Due to some unusual transportation schedules and some poor assumptions on my part, I ended up stranded in Locarno (a beautiful place to be stranded) after a day of hiking and riding the train.  Fortunately, Daniello and Loretta were very kind to come and fetch me that evening!

Unusually late rain for the season has been a common theme in Italy this year, and Lago Maggiore was no exception.  It was a matter of making the best of the clear stretches of weather.  When the weather didn’t cooperate, Daniello tossed me in the car and took me driving to his favorite viewpoints.

Sorry for this title, but I can’t help but think about that Suzanne Vega song “Luka” from the 80’s

My visit to Lucca was quite spontaneous.  It happened to be relatively close to where I was at the time and I had heard good things about it.  The old walled city is an easy walk right across from the train station.  The whole town is nestled in a nice little valley with surrounding Tuscan mountains.  I liked it instantly.  The city didn’t seem overly-touristy to me and it just had an air of good living.  There is a trail around the city – I’m guessing between 1 and 2 miles – that is always buzzing with joggers, walkers, and cyclists burning off all those Italian carbs

I stayed at a nice affittacamera with a kitchen in the old city.  Kind of a whacky set-up, but nice.  The woman who ran the place lived half-way down the block and when you buzzed the front door, it rang at her house down the street.  Also when you wanted to use the Internet, she had some kind of switch to turn it off at her house and on at the apartment.  It worked for about 2 hours my first day but never again after that

The main attraction for me in Lucca was the architecture.  Several beautiful church facades as well as many towers.  One tower there (Torre Guinigi) has trees growing on the top – quite unique – several of the photos in this article were taken from this tower.

Lucca is a good base camp for tours of the many surrounding Tuscan towns nearby.  I’m guessing it is also quieter and less expensive than nearby more famous towns as well.