When we woke this morning there was a white blanket of snow on the mountains and also down quite low towards our house. We took advantage of the snow and the cold and stayed in resting. A well deserved rest as we have really been on the go since we left home over 5 weeks ago. After lunch we headed out for a drive to Ortesei where one of the nine ski lifts (of the 209 in the area) was still running. We caught the cable car up from 1236m to the top at 2005m – the Alpe di Siusi which is the largest high alpine pasture and one of the most famous ski and excursion areas of Europe with its 52 km² mountain surrounded alpine pastures. The Alpe di Siusi is well-known all over the world for its colourful flowers in the summer and its glittering blanket of snow in the winter. It was very picturesque with the snow on the mountains behind, one of them reaching 3091m. Our gondola ride was quite inexpensive only 17 euro return each. At the summit we went for a walk through the pastures as DB hadn’t mapped out any tracks for us today, we had a time limit of 2 hours before the last ride back down the mountain. We decided to just follow the track to the next hut along. It was a very pleasant walk. True to character though DB couldn’t cope with just returning the same way back to the cable car so he worked out a different way back, me being me stressed not that we would get lost but true to DB form it would take longer than anticipated and we would miss the last cable car or be running the last 15 mins to make it. I never really doubt DBs ability to get us anywhere just in time was the issue as it was very cold up there. Anyway, we followed his loop route and arrived in plenty of time. Yippee for DB!!

We then caught the cable car back down and for anyone that is married to an engineer you will know that the view wasn’t the only thing of interest on the way down. Our entire discussion on the descent was about the mechanics of the cable car, how it worked, what would happen should it break and all the logistics that you could discuss over the 10 min trip down. By the way, the view of the town and surrounding mountains was amazing.

We then went into the little village where there was a market stall along the main street selling the usual clothes, parkas, socks, shoes, handbags, fruit and veg, jams, cheeses and sausages. The most populated tents were the wine and beer tents. We bought some fresh nougat which was really yummy. So yummy, I went back and got some more. We then headed back to our little sleepy hollow for an early dinner at a small Italian restaurant where I enjoyed some veal and grilled veges.

We have a big night planning our next destination. We are thinking maybe Barcelona but so far we have worked out this is about a 13 hour drive with a 140 euro toll cost. Can DB do it??