Day 4: The Tyrol Region -- Getting to Lana (September 12)

With Rachel back in Budapest, Julia and I had three days alone and decided to spend it in Northern Italy - the Tyrol region in the Dolomites -- on the recommendation of Roger V (Jim's friend from Caltech) and his wife. They suggested a hotel (1477 RH) in the small town of Lana, which sits between the much larger city of Balzano and the smaller town of Merano. Julia was working some days but took this Monday totally off work so that we could explore the Dolomites. After we took a nice walk along the river in Bassona del Grappa, we decided to drive first to Balzano. Julia guided us to an underground parking lot off a main road in the middle of town, so, we were quite surprised to exit the lot right in the pedestrian plaza in the city center. We were also surprised by the heavy German influence of the area — though still in Italy, signs and menus were in both German and Italian. Though we speak neither, we suddenly felt like we were sorta fluent in Italian because it was so much easier to make out than the German.

We found a cute little restaurant on one of the pedestrian streets off of the main square. Our waiter spoke German, Italian, and English, and we were so happy he didn’t immediately assume to start with us in English. We learned like many in the region he had one Italian parent and one German; if he hadn’t been so busy covering all the tables himself we would have really wanted to get more information from him.

We checked out the cool looking church that was preparing for a funeral later in the day and got some gelato, because when in Italy, but then rather than spending more time in the “big city” of Balzano (it is the largest in the region but still pretty small) we headed to our hotel in Lana.

Our GPS guided us to a VERY fancy place (which might have been understandable since it was recommended by Roger) but I had been expecting something much more arty and rustic. Turns out we were in the wrong place; we had reserved at their sister hotel in town. When we got there it was exactly what I expected!

We got checked in to the hotel and asked about options for hiking so we were told to take a gondola up to the top of the mountain and walk there — which was an option that on the surface didn’t appeal to either of us, given Julia’s fear of heights and my tendency towards altitude sickness, but we decided to brave it. We were the only two people in the gondola car on the way up. At the top, we had the option of going up further on a chair lift or hiking a loop that would take us up and around on foot. We chose the “peaceful and serene” walk that would take us up to the top of the chair lift which we could then take down.

So, we headed out along path #1 in search of our turn onto path #34a following this drawing. And, path 34a never came — we walked through an open field on such an incline that it gave us both a little vertigo and came to a fence that we assumed meant we could go no further. So, we thought maybe the steep driveway up to the house on the hill was somehow path 34a, and it wasn’t but while we were looking around we saw some hikers coming the other way who, rather than seeing the fence as a deterrent, simply opened it and walked through. It was probably just there to keep out cows or something. So, we went through the gate and kept on. After 2 miles and no 34a, we decided we must have passed it and turned around a little indignant about the poor signage.

We walked all the way back to where we started and decided to go up the ski lift since we were running out of time until the last gondola down. Unfortunately, the ski lift was single rider and turned out to be painfully slow and cold. We only went out to the lookout point (which was great) and decided it would be better to walk down than to get back on that ski lift because it had looked so easy on the way up. But, it was actually quite steep and we would have had a really lovely view on the ski lift. We totally made the wrong choice on that one! Julia discovered what a cowbell really is. It wasn’t until we got down to the bottom where the gondola dropped us off that we realized that if we had just unfolded the map Julia was carrying in her hand, we had a full, explicit map with us all along! We had been almost to 34a when we gave up and the signage in these mountains is really top-notch, very German feeling in its accuracy. Total user error!

Everywhere we walked in town there were apple trees. Turns out South Tyrol is the largest single apple growing region in Europe. Apparently, every second apple in Italy and every tenth apple in Europe is grown here!

We decided to go to Moreno for dinner, which should have only been about 10 minutes up the road, but Google took us the wackiest way up. By the time we got turned around, we followed Google to the restaurant and ended up driving into what I was sure was a pedestrian-only zone but what Julia kept assuring me was totally fine.**

Finally, we essentially ended up in the main square next to the town’s church and I convinced Julia that regardless of who was right, it was really stressing me out so we needed to backtrack. She agreed (that I was stressed) and found us a parking lot. We walked to a restaurant for pizza, but the line was too long. So, we ended up choosing a German place where we ordered pizza, pasta, and apple strudel. It is a great combination for us — Italian food with German desserts! The drive back to the hotel was much quicker without any mistakes.

**Update: while together in Budapest in November 2022, I received official notice from the City of Moreno that I was being fined for driving in a pedestrian zone!