sports

Mountain Biking in the Most Beautiful Places on Earth: Italy’s Dolomite Mountains

BY THE TIME THE STEAMING BOWL OF RAVIOLI ARRIVED, SMUGNESS HAD SETTLED OVER ME LIKE THE PASTA’S THICK BLANKET OF MARINARA. Despite worries that I’d flail on our mountain bike traverse of northern Italy’s stunningly beautiful Dolomite Mountains, the early miles had rolled easily beneath my tires. My legs felt strong and the pack with all my possessions had settled nicely on my back, even with the steep terrain and big days. Plus, after years of coughing up a lung in pursuit of my ultra-fit riding companion Joe Sagona, I was actually in front setting the pace.

So, yes, with this solid early performance I was building a pretty full head of self-esteem. After a lifetime of being humbled by better athletes, greater intellects, and sharper wits, you’d think I would have known better. But no.

In my mind I’d already conquered the first big objective of the next morning, a super-steep cliff-lined chute that loomed vertically above our night’s resting spot, the Rifugio Peredu. In most mountainous places, they leave their couloirs to mountain goats and rock slides, but in the Dolomites they build a road that rises 1,500 feet in a little more than a mile. A smorgasbord of dirt, gravel, broken pavement, and cobblestones, it looked from below like a ribbon climbing the inside of a drain spout. In four days of riding, we’d encountered plenty of steeps, including one 45-minute hike-a-bike, but nothing quite like this: nobody ever rode their bikes up it, they just hired low-geared trucks to ferry them up the mountain to the next rifugio, Fodara Vedla. Yes, this would be a worthy testpiece indeed.

At 8 the next morning, Joe and I tackled it. The first couple switchbacks were steep, but manageable; the rocket fuel that passes for coffee in Italian mountain inns saw to that. The next couple were steeper, but dear me, the ones after that were beyond comprehension. With my heaving chest almost touching the top tube, I yanked on the bars for leverage, but my legs were wooden and my lungs on fire and my heart felt like a guinea pig in a paint mixer. Then, as I poured every ounce of strength into moving forward, I was passed by a pair of ambling hikers. That was enough: Convinced I was having a heart attack and on the verge of blacking out, I staggered off my bike and stumbled into the dust.

Dolomites 1, ego 0.

NO MORE WORDS. GIVE ME A GALLERY OF ITALIAN SINGLETRACK PHOTOS.

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WE’D LANDED IN MILAN FIVE DAYS BEFORE, stuffed a rental van with our unwieldy bike cases, and blasted up the autostrade at close to 200 kph, heading first east, then north, before entering the range at the western end of Val Gardena on an emerald summer evening. Our plans were to cross the Dolomites from west to east on our fat-tired full-suspension rigs, mostly under our own power but with occasional help from the odd taxi, bus, or chairlift. With luck we’d create a northeast-trending high route of a couple hundred miles that would finish somewhere near Sesto and the Austrian border, then we’d hire a lift back to the van and head home.

By the end of the first day, though, we found that the Dolomites were much more than we’d anticipated. The trails were steeper, the climbs longer, the overland distance between towns farther. But if the challenge was greater, so, too, was the reward: The network of trails was bigger, the food tastier, and the scenery prettier. When expectations are so thoroughly exceeded by reality, flexibility is in order: Instead of sticking to the original plan and powering across this sublime landscape just to say we’d crossed it, we decided to adopt a more Italian and less Austrian attitude and linger in the areas with the most riding potential–Val Gardena in the west and Cortina in the east–with a two-day overnight tour in between.

One of the most beautiful and striking mountain chains in the world, the Dolomites are characterized by dramatic outcrops of craggy limestone called gruppos, which rise above the surrounding land like islands of rock in a sea of green. Each of the 14 major gruppos stands alone, each to be enjoyed like a sculpture from all angles, set apart from one other by deep channels of river valleys and connected by some of the most breathtaking passes in Europe. The rock soars near vertical, forming towers, spires, castles, and battlements, the pockmarked cliffs and frequent shrouds of mist lending a tattered medieval atmosphere.

The 55- by 60-mile range has a mountaineering and trekking culture that stretches back generations, with a well-established and well-marked network of climbing routes, trails, back roads, and ski lifts that run all summer for hikers, climbers, and bikers. More than a hundred mountain inns called rifugi are strategically located along the trails, usually no more than a few hours’ hike from one another, which means that by mountain bike you’re never very far from the next espresso or plate of pasta. Except during the high season of July and August, when reservations are advisable, you can pedal across the Dolomites with little more than the clothes on your back, knowing that a meal and duvet-covered bed are there for the asking.

NO MORE WORDS. GIVE ME A GALLERY OF ITALIAN SINGLETRACK PHOTOS.

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THE CULTURAL FABRIC OF THE DOLOMITES IS AS VIVID AS THE VISUALS. For centuries, control of the region shifted between various empires and republics. After World War I, Austria lost the region to Italy, and today the area is like a tidal zone where distinctly different cultures intermingle, Austrian efficiency awash with la dolce vita. Towns and villages are officially known by both German and Italian names, both languages are spoken readily, and a 1,600-year-old regional language called Ladin remains the preference of many. Food is a buffet of Austrian and Italian influences, too, with farm-stuffed sausages and heavy Germanic cuisine snuggled up against thick piles of pasta and the lighter Mediterranean palate.

Much of the land in the Dolomites plummets steeply from the bases of the gruppos, but in Val Gardena the archipelagos of rock are surrounded by vast rolling meadows called alps. Once you’ve climbed the steep slopes that rise from the Rio Gardena at the bottom of the valley, either by a cheap chairlift ride or countless revolutions of your granny gear, you’re atop the world in undulating mountain bike eden, with tracks lacing every which way through wildflowers, patches of mushrooms, and broad stretches of green. Alpe di Siusi, on the south flank of the valley, has the most trails, but Alpe di Resciesa, on the north side, has views that will etch themselves into your memory forever. You begin with a three-mile traverse along a smooth path near the top of Resciesa, the fanged limestone towers of Le Odle Geisler pulling you magnetically east. When you finally tear your eyes away from Le Odle, you’ll see the supermodels of the mountain world strutting off to the south: the huge ramparts of Gruppo Sella, the couloir-ridden spires of Sassolungo, and, in the distance, the glaciated north face of Marmolada, the Dolomites’ highest peak.

If and when your attention returns to the trail, you’ll angle back toward the valley, roll off the edge of Alpe di Resciesa, and plummet onto the tilted lower slopes, where the singletrack loops through larch trees, zippers across farm fields, and pinballs down dry creekbeds. Dodging between ancient farmhouses, past old women herding cats, over hand-hewn bridges, you’ll lose altitude so fast your ears pop, until you come at last to a long, snaky, forested section of well-packed earth and then suddenly you’re blinking in the sunlight next to the Rio Gardena with no more descent to descend.

The only thing that could tear us away from Val Gardena was the promise of more and better in Cortina, an hour to the east. Leaving the narrow valley on a warm September morning, we wound our way up and over Passo Gardena and parked the rental van at the base of Monte Cavallo. Shouldering ultra-light packs, we mounted up and set a casual pace that took us along the western border of the Parco Naturale delle Dolomiti d’Ampezzo, across acres of fossilized seabeds, until in late afternoon we reached the welcome sight of the Rifugio Peredu.

It was the next morning that found me on the climb between Peredu and Fodara, driven to my knees in the dust, riding a collapsing wave of arrogance. Humbled, I walked and rode and walked again. When we finally got to the top of the pass, we found a chapel the size of a toolshed, where I left a small offering of lira as thanks for surviving.

Over the next five hours, we alternated between well-traveled hiking paths and unmarked trails, between smooth bike freeways and rooty hazard-fields, stopping for a brief lunch of spinach ravioli in the middle of a cow pasture at Rifugio Ra Stua. Refueled, we vectored south toward Cortina, but veered west around a peak called Col Rosa so we could hike along one of the Dolomite’s via ferrati, a cabled climbing route, which carried us beneath the roaring waterfall of Cascada di Fanes. Finally, we grunted up one more climb, a World War I supply route now degenerated to singletrack, and began the last long downhill into Cortina, the cosmopolitan climbing center of the Dolomites.

I left Joe lounging in a pool of late-afternoon sunlight in one of Cortina’s cobblestone squares and, grabbing a taxi to ferry me and my bike up to the top of Passo Falzarego, went to get the van. The driver dropped me off in the parking lot of Ristorante Falzarego, and I got on my bike and climbed for another 15 minutes, to the crest of Passo di Valparola. As I bombed down the other side, stunned at the joy of rocketing down one of the Europe’s glorious mountain passes with no cars in sight, I thought of all the trails, roads, pavement, taxis, chairlifts, and bikes we’d used to cross northern Italy. When it comes to mountain biking in the Dolomites, I realized, anything goes, and la vita is much more dolce because of it.

NO MORE WORDS. GIVE ME A GALLERY OF ITALIAN SINGLETRACK PHOTOS.

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GETTING THERE
Milan, with daily non-stop flights on Alitalia (800-223-5730) from New York and Los Angeles, is a four-hour drive from the Dolomites. Bike shops are sparse, with limited parts, so bring extra tubes, etc. Tabacco brand topo maps are indispensable; order from Omnimap (800-742-2677, http://www.omnimap.com) or buy them at any tourist shop in the Dolomites.

Photographer Dan Patitucci moved to the Dolomites in 2007 and has put together a fantastic site introducing newcomers to the region. This page will give you the basics better than any Lonely Planet or Rough Guide, with links to weather sites, tips on timing, and more.

Don’t want to go on your own? Holomites runs mountain biking and trail running tours.

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