Afterthought

We told our tour leader that we wanted a refund, the Alps have disappeared

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Pictures Day 5 our last day in Sappada

Our group coming down the mountain

Our path

Our photograph extraordinaire

Rock that must have fallen centuries ago

View of Sappada from up high

Paths and our group going up does not look easy

Two friends

Having a rest

A brook

Sort of mid point of our walk

Our trail

Looking down on the valley

Day 5 Sappada

Our last day of walking and rain is in the forecast and according to our guide Charlie rain will come around 3:00 so he changed his plan so that we would not get wet and he was right on, we had a few thunder and lightning and very gentle rain

Learn a lot about the trees of this area as well as plants. Red and white firs, larch, very little beech.

Conifer because they have cones, some falls other stay up

We saw a plant eating insect.

Diversity of scenery, meditation and quiet is heaven on a trail.

Definition of a forest is many diffetent trees, wood is usually small area and only a few species.

Definition of clouds no contact with the lower section and fog close to the ground.

A great walk and beautiful views of mountains all around us.

This has been a wonderful trip and enjoyed every moment of it.

Tomorrow on our way to Venice, where 7 of us will stay, 2 are going to England and the rest back to Canada.

Day 4 Pictures

Pictures of Art Work

Water in the pond is fed by mountain water flowing to the lake then to the little river below

My little friend, last two pictures notice the wooden clog

Overlooking the village

Path, flowers in the meadow, trail going to one of the huts

Mountain at night

The 14 stations of the cross at night leading to chapel on top of mountain

Our hotel, last picture mountain in front of hotel

Our trail going up the mountain

Day 4 Sappada

Our walk is up the mountain behind our hotel and we climbed 350 meters, came upon a few huts along the way and came up to a plateau and had a magnificent view of the valley. Saw many wild flowers in the meadows.

Stopped at 12:00 for a snack at Plodar Kelder – Formaggi e Salumi di Sappada had a beer courtesy of our hike leader as well as 3 types of cheeses, salami and very thin prosciutto, very nice

Went for another 2 hours of walking, very relax and easy also beautiful and calm along a little river.

Pictures of day 3

As we were going up in the mountains did not get the opportunity to take a lot of pictures

The first is where the italian army train in the winter

A meadow looking toward the rock that resemble rocks in Arizona

First picture of lake, that is where we were walking to when going down

Second our group starting our descent

Third the path through small stones

Mountain facing us

More mountains

More mountains

Pretty lake where we had our lunch

Notice how tall are the trees

Last picture shows our path

Second last picture is the Tre Cime

Day 3 Tre Cime

The Tre Cime di Lavaredo for also called the Drei Zinnen (German for “three merlons).

They are probably one of the best-known mountain groups in the Alps. The three peaks, from east to west, are:

Cima Piccola / Kleine Zinne (“little peak”)

Cima Grande / Große Zinne (“big peak”)

Cima Ovest / Westliche Zinne (“western peak”).

The peaks are composed of well-layered dolostones of the Dolomia Principale formation, Carnian to Rhaetian in age, as are many other groups in the Dolomites (e.g., the Tofane, the Pelmo or the Cinque Torri).

Until 1919 the peaks formed part of the border between Italy and Austria. Now they lie on the border between the Italian provinces of South Tyrol and Belluno and still are a part of the linguistic boundary between German-speaking and Italian-speaking majorities. The Cima Grande has an elevation of 2,999 metres (9,839 ft). It stands between the Cima Piccola, at 2,857 metres (9,373 ft), and the Cima Ovest, at 2,973 metres (9,754 ft).

I always imagined Tyrol being in Austria but not true. The largest cities in Tyrol are Innsbruck, Trento and Bolzano. The whole region of Tyrol is located in the Alps. Tyrol is bordered to the north by the state of Bavaria and to the east by the states of Carinthia and Salzburg. West of Tyrol lies the state of Vorarlberg and the canton of Grisons.

The upper belt consists in conifers: the Norway spruce (particularly abundant in the sparse wood of the Vallunga in the Parco Naturale Puez-Odle and in the Paneveggio Forest in Trentino), larch (in fall turns a beautiful yellow and we saw many of them) and the Swiss stone pine form the belt which comes before the zone dominated by mugo pines, by shrubs like rhododendrons and many others.

We were supposed to do the Tre Cime on Thursday but our guide changed the plan because rain and thunder is forecasted for that day. The trail is about 50 km from our hotel so we are going in two mini vans and leaving at 8:00am

Left almost on time, the road led us toward Cortina, followed a small river for quite some times and drove thru a tunnel of 4500 meters, took the road to Auronzo instead of continuing to Cortina. In Auronzo there will be boat races on the lake coming up, we saw many flags of many countries, the lake is a beautiful green colour.

Misurina another town on our way to Tre Cime.

Misurina is Auronzo di Cadore town’s highest hamlet. Its name ‘the Pearl of the Dolomites’ tells you a great deal about its beauty and magnificence.

Its 1756 metre above sea level lake reflects the south east slopes of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo and the Cadini, Sorapiss and Cristallo massifs and is in the heart of the UNESCO Dolomite Heritage area.

Famous the world over for its special microclimate and its pure, health-giving air, Misurina is a centre for the cure of respiratory illnesses – together with Davos in Switzerland – with its Pio XII Institute. So Misurina is to all intents and purposes a ‘Healthy Air Oasis’. We stopped for a break and admire the lake

De cadore end of name of many towns is name after the valley, and prior to that were called

Catubrigum which then became ‘Cadubrium’ – meaning literally “the castle on the rock”.

Today’s walk was the best so far for me. We walked up about 500 meters, we had the choice to walk up to the Tre Cime or take a bus to the Rifugio and walk around the mountain, the concensus was we came here to walk and we all wanted to go up. When we reached the Rifugio after walking some parts around the Tre Cime, some walkers decided to take the bus to the lake and the rest would walk down, 500 meters or 5 km because our hike leader said it was always downhill and hard on the knees, for me it is the going up, down much easier. It took us one hour to get down, absolutely loved it, was very quiet, we could hear the birds singing and we were literally surrounded by mountains. We also walked on the snow, then in a forest before reaching the van. Have to mention that there were lots of loose stones but not too difficult to walk on.

Tomorrow will have another walk but are told it would be easier.

Will try pictures tomorrow, it is 10:30 and time for bed for a well deserve sleep.