Today we started with the usual tidy up and left about 10am for what promised to be a very scenic 5 hour journey. We'd decided to bypass toll roads since it would have only reduced our journey time slightly, and we knew the route along the river between the mountains would be very interesting.
We soon left behind the rolling hills of Tarcento for the more jagged, rocky peaks of the Kanins and Dolomites. We stopped at a supermarket in a small town to pick up lunch and a few treats - somehow a bottle each of prosecco and limoncello found their way into our trolley. Plus some tubs of gelato for snack time.
Then back on to the mountain roads. We originally thought that because the road followed the river it would be fairly flat, but that notion was quickly dispelled. It wasn't the worst rollercoaster road we've been on, but it was very steep and bendy at times.
It was getting pretty hot as it neared the middle of the day, so we decided to stop in a small village, where we ignored the mounting heat and decided to climb up to a small park and back down through some pretty, communally owned, terraced gardens, complete with plenty of lizards. We bought some overpriced but very tasty fruit from a stall by the road and decided to press on and try to find somewhere more shady for lunch.
This we found down a side road, at the entrance to some woods - not the most scenic location but nice and quiet. After lunch we had a brief stop at a waterfall, and a quick diversion to look at a fort, but that was all, until we decided to do gelato round two.
The border area between Italy and Austria is basically bilingual, and it was definitely getting more Austrian. We stopped at a roadside cafe that advertised eis/gelati, but were disappointed to find that meant a fridge full of prepacked ice creams.
Google search directed us on to the next town, but we made the mistake of ignoring its recommendation due to the long queue outside and the fact we wanted sundaes, and headed to a cafe instead. It was pleasant enough, but the sundaes were nothing special and quite expensive, it was a lovely town to visit though.
The remainder of our journey across the border and to our accommodation went smoothly. We were pleased to get a view of the nearby glacier as we drove down the valley, on Thursday we will be taking the cable car most of the way up and going into an ice cave inside the glacier - I can't wait!
Published on Wednesday 8 August 2018
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