Day 13: Sappada to Cortina + Passa Giau

Day 13 · Cortina

Lighter riding day today, which was a lovely change from yesterday. I slept great for the first time of the trip, that mattress in Sappada was the best one yet. And it was super quiet – the only sound I heard was the braying of a donkey after sunrise. Since I wasn’t in a rush today and I slept so well, I took my time getting up and heading to my next stop.

The room I have today and tomorrow is probably not going to be as great. I think it’s likely to be the worst room in the place since it’s right next to the lobby bathroom and only has a twin bed. But it’s cute and clean and I’m here now. I do have a bluetooth speaker to drown out some noise at least!

The ride today was gorgeous (of course it was) as it wound deeper into the Dolomites. Since I’m skipping the planned ride for tomorrow to do the via Feratta (very excited about that as I got a look at the mountains), I decided to do the one little pass that I wouldn’t hit on my ride out of Cortina on Tuesday – the Passa Giau. It was only about 30 minutes past my hotel to get to the summit (literally – I stopped and checked into the hotel to use the bathroom and have lunch on my way there).

The Dolomites are indeed majestic – and kind of otherworldly. They stick up out of the trees and alpine grasses like weird alien mountains.

I’m very excited to be doing a via feratta here to see them up close and catch another side of the landscape. If you don’t remember, a Via Feratta is like a hike, with some rock climbing. I don’t believe this one has the ladders and bridges and tightrope walks of the one over toward Interlakken that I did not do – but this one does go through some infrastructure from WWI so I think it’ll still be very cool. I’m also looking forward to using my arms for something other than shifting gears and hauling my bags up 3 flights of stairs.

Wifi here seems better finally – possibly because I’m on the ground floor this time. I think if leave my GoPro plugged in for the next 36 hours it might actually be successful at uploading my last 3 days worth of videos to the cloud.

I wandered around town for a bit, enjoyed a spritz, headed to a market for tomorrows ferrata lunch, and had a big burger for dinner. Since I’m leaving before breakfast service starts, they provided me with instant coffee and a woefully insufficient bag breakfast. I would have gotten more snacks had I known they consider a croissant, a pastry, a pack of nuttella and a bottle of juice a breakfast. I know I’m a rarity with my dense, protein heavy breakfasts, but I need them! I’m going to be hungry 8 minutes into the hike.

Anyway. Time to rest up!