Guide to walking in the Central Italian Alps – Italy, Europe

• Location
• Description
• Contents
• Introduction
• Sample Route
• Maps

The Area

Walking through this border region means following in the footsteps of Stone Age hunters, Holy Roman Emperors, salt smugglers, German migrant miners, Venetian merchants and First World War troops, not to mention dwarves and giants.

A vast area in the central part of north Italy is covered, namely the Italian side of the Rhaetian Alps. From the borders with Switzerland and Austria, it is delimited by Meran, Bozen (South Tyrol) and Trento (Trentino) in the east, across to Valcamonica at the western edge, and up through Bormio (Lombardy). Most of the itineraries run through protected areas – the Stelvio National Park and the Provincial Nature Parks of Texel and Adamello – and include everything from meadows and wood through to snow fields, glaciers and spectacular summits.

The incredibly varied natural landscape, with an essentially metamorphic rock base, is the result of modelling by glaciers combined with weathering by wind and rain. The retreat in stages of ancient ice masses left tell-tale signs in ridges of glacial debris (moraine), U-shaped valleys and polished and grooved rock surfaces. There are still several sizeable glaciers (notably Adamello and Forni), not to mention remnants, hanging glaciers, left in armchair-like cirques. Countless small lakes (tarns) have formed where abandoned rubble obstructed a valley and waterfalls are plentiful.

Each different zone has a rich history. Prehistory has left treasures in the form of rock engravings in Valcamonica and the Similaun ‘Iceman’. After Roman colonisation came turbulent medieval times starring Margaret of the Big Mouth and Frederick of the Empty Pockets. Lombardy, South Tyrol and Trentino were variously under Bavaria, France and Austria.

During the First World War, the front (dividing Austria’s weakening Hapsburg Empire and Italy) ran along the mountain ridges from Stilfser Joch south to Monte Adamello, curved southeast to Lago di Garda, before heading northeast to the Marmolada. Though very few actual battles took place on this impervious terrain (even the ice-bound 3905m Ortler peak was occupied and equipped with cannons), enormous numbers of lives were lost to avalanches and the treacherous cold. There are modest war museums at Vermiglio in Val di Sole and Temù in Valcamonica, but walkers will often come across crumbling fortifications and rusty relics given up by the retreating ice masses.

At present, Lombardy together with Trentino are ‘Italian’ areas, culturally (and gastronomically) speaking. South Tyrol, on the other hand, consists of two-thirds native German speakers, with the rest Italians and a tiny fraction (1/20) speakers of Ladin, and ancient Rhaetian dialect.