Part Time Living in the Italian Alps

We have chosen the Italian alps as a potential area for part time living. We think it has everything we are looking for: incredible mountains, world class skiing and hiking, quaint cobblestone villages, amazing food and culture, progressive government, and low real estate prices. Is this too much to hope for? We shall see. We had a trip planned before the pandemic and had to cancel it, so this has been a trip two years in the making.

Oct 7: We couldn’t believe the views of the alps as we slowly descended into Milan. After we got our rental car, the small drive to Bergamo turned into quite an intense introduction into Italian driving! Even with a Garmin GPS it’s pretty hard sometimes to make the proper turns. Add heavy traffic and confusing Italian traffic signs to the mix and I definitely was glad to reach our destination (Hotel La Valletta Relais) at Bergamo and park the car for the day.

Oct 8: We spent the day exploring Citta Alta, a Unesco world heritage site and by far the most interesting area of Bergamo. This is an amazing place; ancient, thousand year old walls, ramparts, churches and castles, integrated into modern Italian life, with all its apartments, villas, cafes, restaurants, and schools. Vineyards and farms coexist in the same area and you can see farmers picking fruit as you walk along narrow cobblestone streets to the inner city. You can buy a condo here for under $200,000. Detached houses start at $500K. This is Italy at its best. Milan is only an hour away, ski slopes two hours away.

Oct 9: Driving into the Dolomites for the first time was quite a mesmerizing experience. The craggy peaks just tower over the valleys and are an ever present reminder how spectacular this area is. The roads are narrow and wind up and over steep passes with amazing views. Snow covers the highest peaks and it’s only early October. Small alpine villages dot the landscape. Many restaurants and shops are already closed for the season, but enough hikers and vacationers are here to help make it worthwhile for those businesses that stay open. Some places ask to see our vaccination cards, but most businesses don’t really care. We are almost the only people in our hotel. Tomorrow we get to do our first hike in the Italian alps. This night we are staying at the Hotel Garni Ongaro in Santa Fosca. From our balcony, we have a great view of the highest peak of the Dolomites, the Queen of the Dolomites, Monte Marmalade!

Oct 10: Sunday must have been a national race day and every driver automatically entered. We were constantly being passed by speeding drivers, amazed at their split second timing as they zipped by us and re-entered the right lane while just missing oncoming traffic. But we stuck to our pace and made our way to what we thought would be a trail head, but our GPS actually just took us to a spot on the road with no discernible trail indications at all! We eventually found another trail and getting there was an adventure by itself. We were driving on town roads so narrow we sometimes thought it must be a sidewalk of some kind. But, no, it was a road and it’s totally normal. The hiking in this area is dominated by several mountains, the most famous being the king of the Dolomites, Monte Pelmo.

Oct 11: Two of the most popular sports for Italians are skiing and biking, and we got a taste of what these sport enthusiasts do here. We drove up and over three mountain passes on our way from Santa Fosca to Cortina. I lost count of the number of ski areas, at least a dozen. Some had insanely steep slopes, which to me, could easily be considered extreme skiing. And as we drove some very steep roads, we constantly came across bikers arduously peddling up to the summit of these passes. These are probably training rides for the Giro d’Italia (Italy’s version of the Tour de France). Very impressive.

Oct 12: Hiking in the alps is a bit different than hiking in Colorado. Colorado hikes typically start at higher elevations and go up from there, usually requiring many miles before getting good views of mountains. The alps start at lower elevations but you are immersed in towering mountain formations almost immediately. In Colorado, hikes are a wilderness experience, ending in lakes, or mountain tops. In the alps, a common destination is a restaurant! I mean, you can hike the most dramatic, gut wrenching, death defying hike, through seemingly untouched forests and steep canyons, and after 5 miles, find yourself at a rifugio (mountain hut). These almost always include a nice restaurant and even accommodations in the summer. That was our experience today. Although the Rifugio was closed for the season, we were still amazed that this kind of thing exists. And to be honest, I was wishing it was open!

Oct 13: Italy has probably hundreds of cable cars that take you to the top of some of the most stunning peaks. Usually, there is a restaurant at the top, and from there, endless miles of hiking trails in summer and ski trails in winter. A visit to the alps would not be complete without a cable car ride. So today we rode the Lagazuoi cable car near Cortina. It starts from Falzarego Pass and goes to the top of Mount Lagazuoi. It was incredibly scenic, a little scary, and very cold.

Oct 14: Hike day today. We went to Tre Cime, which is a very popular hiking destination near Cortina. Hundreds of cars at the trailhead. But it’s a really good hike with amazing views. We took a side trail as the main trail was so busy, and it was probably the steepest trail I’ve ever hiked. Steeper than hiking the Grand Canyon! I’m in pretty good shape and these hikes totally wear me out. The alps are definitely a hikers paradise. Just be ready for a lot of steep trails.

Oct 15: Now that we’ve been here almost a week, it’s time to evaluate the real estate market here. I like Cortina a lot. It definitely has more downhill skiing and hiking than anywhere I have ever visited. It has a pedestrian friendly downtown, including a main street where cars are not allowed. It’s not overrun with huge condo complexes like in US ski towns. But it’s a bit small and doesn’t have much going on in the evenings. Still, let’s look at prices. I found a handful of apartments for sale in the downtown area between $500K and $750K, but they all seemed problematic: 4th floor attic apartment with no lift, or a place with no parking. Decent places will be way over 1 million and there doesn’t seem to be that many properties available. Cortina is very popular and the real estate prices are just too high to consider an investment here.

Oct 16: Did a crazy hike to a waterfall. This hike included an incredibly steep 200 foot descent to the river below where the waterfall ends. I am a little afraid of heights and there was no way I was going to do this. But Sudy, the ever enthusiastic hiker, decided to go, so I figured, might as well join her. Needless to say, it was very scary (for me).

Oct 17: No trip to Europe would be complete without at least one visit to a castle! We try to visit as many as we can, they are just so fascinating, majestic, and incredibly old. Today we went to the Bruneck Castle, about an hour from Cortina. They have it set up as a museum of artifacts from all over the world, focusing on mountain cultures. You get to wander the castle and also see all these artifacts. This castle was built in 1250, and although it was restored, much of the main walls are from the original construction.

Oct 18: On to Bolzano. I always have to mentally prepare myself for driving in Italy. What with narrow and winding roads, false navigational directions from Garmin, and numerous Italian road signs which I am still learning to read, there is also the constantly changing speed limits. If you aren’t paying attention, you can get a violation from the ubiquitous speed cameras. You won’t know until you come home as they are sent to the rental car company, who then sends you a receipt of the charges they place on your credit card. Surprise! But when you do follow the speed limits, Italians (who know where the cameras are) will tailgate you relentlessly. You need to have a thick skin and just ignore it. If I am following a driver, then I go the same speed as they do. I assume they will slow down where needed.

We had time to do a small hike on the other side of Tre Cime, and it was spectacular as we figured it would be.

Oct 19: We plan to stay in Bolzano for a week so we got a really nice apartment near downtown for our time here. Spent the day exploring Bolzano’s old town area. It is more German than Italian here. German is spoken in most of the shops that we visited, and the architecture of the buildings seems to have a huge German influence. It’s a bustling city, with a pedestrian only old town area larger than any we have ever seen. Apparently, this is also the most expensive city in Italy, even more expensive than Cortina. No deals here.

Oct 20: The damn cable car we were going to take to the top of a mountain above Bolzano broke right as we were waiting in line to board! So we decided to walk up to the mountain top where the cable car ends and hoped it would be fixed by the time we finished our hike so we could ride it back down. Can’t be that bad right?

Oh yes it can! Just to try and describe how hard this hike was, when we had reached a sign saying we were half way there, I was already so tired I was ready to turn back. The whole hike was 4 miles of 15 to 20 percent grade and it never let up! At 3/4 of the way, I lost feeling in my legs. By the time we were near the summit, I could only think of a huge stein of cold beer. The rest of my body had given up protesting miles ago and was just moving from a primitive survival mechanism.

Of course, Sudy had no problem, she just bounces around like it’s an outing in the park. She’s amazing. If it weren’t for her encouraging me, I seriously would have quit a long time before we reached the summit. Wow! I’m scared to contemplate what further hikes await me, but it was beautiful!

Oct 21: Bolzano is like a little New York with busy streets and not nearly enough room for all the cars, people, homes, and businesses. Yet somehow, it all works. One thing we are noticing here is the occasional bad air quality. We also had noticed this in Cortina, where too much smoke from people’s wood burning stoves can result in poor air quality. And it’s not even that cold yet! This air quality issue was quite unexpected and could be a huge negative to living in the alps, if it’s going to be really bad in winter. Hopefully we will get a better feel for this as we get into colder weather.

Today we visited another small castle in Bolzano called Roncolo. This castle is very unique in that many of the interior walls have 800 year old frescoes of life in the Middle Ages. This is very unusual, and it was fun to explore the castle with all these amazing frescoes painted in so many rooms.

Oct 22, Upper Bolzano, also known as Soprabolzano, is a world away from the hustle and bustle of Bolzano. The cable car was working just fine today, so we could ride that up and hike one of the many footpaths that meander through the countryside and small villages. It’s a very quiet, peaceful, and picturesque part of South Tyrol. The weather was perfect and the fall colors were in full display.

Oct 23: So how about Bolzano? Would this be a good town for part time living? Short answer is no. It’s a fun town to visit, and I really liked the upper Bolzano area for hikes, but it’s too busy and congested and prices are high. The upper Bolzano area is much more relaxed and open, but prices there are even higher. No 1 euro houses here!

Explored a small town called Chiusa near Bolzano and then visited Trostburg Castle. Chiusa is known as one of the most beautiful small towns in Italy, so we had to check it out. And it is a really nice little town with a lot of character and a great cobblestone, pedestrian only town center.

Trostburg castle can only be visited in a tour, and the tour guide only spoke German and Italian, so that was a bummer, but we still enjoyed seeing the inside and going through all the rooms.

Oct 24: No stay in Bolzano would be complete without a visit to the South Tyrol Museum of Archeology, where they have an incredible exhibit of a 5,000 year old man they call Otzi. He was perfectly preserved in a glacier for thousands of years and only recently discovered in the early 90s.

They have his remains and personal effects on display at this museum. From his body and the equipment he had with him, scientists have been able to piece together an amazing amount of information on his life, how he survived, how he died, how he was preserved so well, and about the culture of that time in history.

Oct 25: Even though Ortisei is only 36 kilometers from Bolzano, it was a full day event to drive here on these slow mountain roads. Add stops for coffee, a small hike, lunch, and taking in the views, and we didn’t get here until late afternoon. Winter here is fast approaching with temperatures dipping below 30 at night and fall colors peaking. Cable cars are still running but will likely close soon until ski season kicks in around mid December. There are some Americans here, but most tourists are from other EU countries.

Oct 26: As is typical for many towns in the Dolomites, Ortisei has a cable car that takes hikers to great trails in summer and skiers to fantastic skiing in winter. The cable car we took today goes to the Alpe di Siusi, Europe’s largest alpine plateau. The trail we hiked also had many mountain bikers, and we actually would have preferred that we had rented bikes. The trails here are not steep and the plateau is vast, so a mountain bike is definitely the way to go. But no matter, the mountains here are majestic.

Oct 27: Beautiful fall day, so we decided to take a drive and view the colors. Val Gardena (the valley where Ortisei is located) is well known for great skiing so we drove up through the valley and over Passo Gardena to Corvara. Unbelievable ski areas everywhere. I guess Italy has over 200! And the fall colors were really spectacular.

We also drove up to Passo Sella where we had visited on the way to Cortina two weeks ago. Today we came up from the other side and we actually had no idea it was the same pass we had been to before until we reached the top and recognized the gift shop and hotel. I was amazed! Kinda have gone full circle in a way.

Oct 28: From Ortisei we drove to a National park called Parco Naturale Puiz-Odle. This is a beautiful area close to a small town called Santa Magdalena with the Odle mountain range as a backdrop to all the hikes. Here, like in most Italian parks, they don’t have roads that you can use to drive to different trailheads within the park. All trails start at the entrance, so that’s where you park. So it’s rather busy at these entrances. You have large parking lots, multiple guest accommodations and multiple restaurants. But once you are on the trails you have the mountains almost all to yourself, if it’s not summer. It’s slow season now, but in the summer, this place would be quite busy. This is why off season travel is the only way to go.

As we have been driving around for awhile now, one thing that is very noticeable is the amount of wood piled up everywhere. It’s stacked neatly up against people’s homes and on their decks, it’s piled up in the form of logs in various places in the national forests, and even huge log piles exist along many mountain roads. We think most of this wood is for a single purpose, to provide fuel for wood burning stoves. And if all these stoves are being used for heat, I would expect there may be some air quality issues in the alps. We already notice a haze in the air some days. I wonder how bad it gets when winter really sets in.

Oct 29: Had an easy drive getting to Bressonone from Ortisei, so we visited Velthurns Castle and Sabiona Monastery, an almost 2,000 year old monastery above a small town called Chiusa. I’m always amazed at the incredible abilities of the artisans and craftsmen of those days to build such magnificent buildings that are not only beautiful, but strong enough to last through the ages.

Oct 30: Still in Bressonone, today was our last hike in the alps. Extended rain and snow is coming and we will probably head south soon. But our hike in the Plose ski area was a great place for a final hike.

Oct 31: Over the last few weeks, we have explored a couple dozen small and medium towns in the Italian alps. We have stayed at a few places for more than a few days, and we have driven, hiked, and explored these mountains pretty thoroughly. And what is our conclusion on the potential for living here part time? It’s a fantastic place for a vacation, incredibly scenic, but there are some negatives that make us feel it is not an ideal place to live. Here are the negatives.

• Desirable areas are too expensive
• There is an air quality problem in many towns, especially small ski villages
• It is not fun to drive in Italy
• It is very congested in most towns as far as living space
• Summers are very crowded with tourists
• The predominant culture is German, not Italian

But it’s been a fantastic trip and we will miss all those incredible hikes!