Ortisei
25/06/2023
For the next few days we followed the same routine. After breakfast the first stop was at the supermarket. Glorious cheese they sliced for us, cooked meats, fresh bread, fruit and water. It meant we could have a picnic wherever we wanted when we were in the hills. Then headed off.
Seceda Cable car.
This is the other cable car available from the centre of town. But this goes to the other side of the valley.
This was a long ride that finished near the summit of the mountain. Then we walked through the summer meadow and caught a bus back to town.
This was the view from the Cable Car Station
Before going down we headed up towards the top of the meadow and this was the view at the other side.
The walk down followed good paths and curved around the slope in large arcs.
Looking up the mountain – the cablecar station is roughly a third of the way along the ridgeline.
Looping round it opened up views of other parts of the valley
Eventually we reached a second cable car to go back down into the valley and caught a bus back
26/06/2023
Telecabina Forcella del Sassolungo.
The longest walk of the trip. We caught a bus to the end of Val Vardena. Then it was a cablecar and a six seater chairlift to reach the base of a very large lump of rock.
We then walked around the peak which opened views into a different valley.
to catch the coffin, aka Telecabina Forcella del Sassolungo. It starts at Passo Sella (Sella Pass) and ascends to the Toni Demetz Hut at an altitude of 2,695 meters
Getting onto the chairlift was unusual to say the least. I had to stand on one mark, Tina was around 3m away. I had to swing myself round to get in. Then Tina by some combination jumped or was thrown in behind me. Then the door was locked. I have never been on anything like it. Being so light, the cabin moved in the wind. When it stopped (which it did regularly) we swayed a lot. The last section felt almost vertical.
The views back were stunning. At the top the door was unlocked. We basically linked arms with one of the guys and swung out. The frequent stopping were people who needed more time to get off.
It was the end of June, I was in shorts and t-shirt, the snow at the top was knee deep.
The views on the other side were breathtaking. We could see dark dots on the side. Looking closer they were walkers.
We then made the decision to walk down. The first coupleof hours were paths that criss-crossed the scree slopes, mostly it was okay, but some involved sliding on my backside.
Being a mountain in Europe, there was obviously the opportunity for a bar.
Looking back up to the bar – we cam down the valley to the left – everything had to be carried in.
We came out at the other side of Sassolungo and needed to walk round the peak back to the chairlift. The views were stunning.
The path we were on, came out midway along the chair lift. We had a choice to walk up a steep slope or walk down to the cable car. We went down.
The next issue is that time was passing, and the cable car was due to stop running. All I can say is walking quickly downhill after around 4 hours walking is not recommended.
We made it and had time for a quick drink before catching the bus back.
It is without doubt one of my favourite days from any of our holidays