Wandering Yet Again: Campo di Trens – Day 61 along the Via Romea.

I awoke this morning to a magnificent view from my bed, and on heading to breakfast had a delicious start to the day. While I was in Austria the breakfasts had reverted to light, white bread rolls, and no cereal. Today I had muesli and wonderful grainy brown bread rolls. A very good start to the day indeed.

Lying in bed - this is what I saw.

My Gasthaus, also the young river that has kept growing all day.

I set off in the early morning cool, heading along the old railway track that has now been converted into a cycling path. It was shady most of the way, and the further I went the wider the valley became and the further away the trains and autobahn got, though the began with them within easy ”lobbing” distance. The descent was very gradual, until I got to the turn off to Colle Isarco. It was here that the descent became a steep zig zag. A cold drink energised me for the next stretch which was up hill and across the valley to go under the autobahn.

The narrow valley - autobahn far left (the train line is on the left of that), the main road, and the cycle track.

Looking back to the mountains

........and looking forward - the path even goes through the old tunnels .......

... and has the old station buildings along the way.

The rock had the markings from the drills.

The valley got wider.

Looking down on Colle Isarco, before descending.

From there the path went through some lovely woods, passing a wonderful waterfall, to Vipiteno, though as is my wont, I somehow lost the proper path and followed my own route the last couple of kilometres. I stopped for lunch there, and enjoyed watching the locals, and the tourists, as I consumed a delicious bowl of macaroni bolognese.

Vipiteno

Leaving Vipiteno

With only 4 – 5 kilometres to go I headed off to my destination. It began ambling through the outskirts of the town, past an aerodrome where I paused to watch a glider take off. But then one of those “when will this end?” moments arrived. The path was sandwiched between the river on the left, and the main road on the right. It was fenced on the road side, and the fast flowing river was around 2 metres deep – so the gauge I passed showed, and so there was no escape. It went on, straight as an arrow, for around three kilometres and believe me, I was very glad to get to the hotel and put my feet up.