Italy instead of Scandinavia

After our stopover in Switzerland at the end of June, we wanted to travel on to Scandinavia. Norway has reopened the borders for tourists from mid-July, but unfortunately only for people who have been vaccinated or who have recovered from Covid 19. Since we are not vaccinated, we had to cancel the trip to Norway. We would have liked to travel around Sweden, Norway and Finland on a tour. Since this was not possible for us now, we decided to visit these three countries at some point in the future instead, when everything has hopefully returned to normal.

Instead of heading north, we drove south again. Fortunately, we came to Italy without vaccination and without PCR testing. We spent the first two weeks in Vinschgau. Vinschgau is located in northern Italy in South Tyrol and is known for its many apple orchards. For us, an additional advantage of South Tyrol is that the people there also speak German, so we did not have to rely on our basic knowledge of Italian.

We explored the region by bike and on foot. Vinschgau offers countless single trails for mountain bikers. Everything from nice flow over soft forest paths with steep wall curves to very technical, rocky paths. In short, everything that makes a biker’s heart beat faster.

Another alpine tour was on the program again. From Sulden we climbed Ortler 3905 m above sea level. First of all, the route took us over well-marked hiking trails, past Payerütte and then over a simple ridge with beautiful climbing to the beginning of the glacier. Up on the glacier we could follow a good trail to the top. From the top we had a wonderful view of the surrounding mountains and the passage. Due to the strong wind, there was only a short rest at the top. After 10 hours we returned to our motorhome in Sulden. Then we had felled 2500 meters up and down, tired and satisfied.

After Vinschgau we drove on towards the Dolomites. First with a short detour to the Alpe di Siusi, where we not only found good bike paths but also many blueberries and raspberries in the forest. As it was cold in the Dolomites with a lot of rain and thunder, we packed our camper and drove towards the beautiful and warmer weather in Abruzzo. We have been in Abruzzo in the Apennines since the beginning of August. The landscape of the Gran Sasso National Park is wild and barren and a bit reminiscent of Mongolia. Like the nomads in Mongolia, we stop and explore the surrounding area while waiting with excitement for how our journey will continue.