San Martino in Castrozza
Every year our company does a settimana verde or “green week” in the mountains in northern Italy. This is the third year the The Tandem Spirits have gone with the group, which includes both current employees and retirees with their families and friends. This year, there group had 84 people. Our location was San Martino in Castrozza, in the region of Trentino Alto Adige. It is considered to be the base of the Dolomites. We all stayed in the Hotel San Martino, which was nice as we could have breakfast and dinner together every day. Our rooms were were not large, but ours had a great view of the mountains.
After our long bus ride, we arrived at the hotel late in the afternoon, but we did have time to walk into town, look around a bit and have an aperativo. Then it was time to unpack, and organize things in our room, have dinner and prepare for the week.
Three Group Excursions
Over the course of the week, we had three group excursions and three days free to explore on our own. Our group activities included:
1) A hike from Passo Rolle to laghetto Baita Segantini. This was on winding roads that were not too steep. We had packed a lunch, so when we stopped a rifugio, we just got some beers and found a place in the shade to enjoy them with our sandwiches. We were lucky to have found a spot under the eves as the clouds rolled in after we had finished eating and there was a storm that started with rain but soon turned to hail.
2) A walk along the Marciò trail through the Forest of the Violins, where the wood for great violins such as Stradivarius comes from. We had to go over a small Tibetan bridge to cross the Travignolo Torrent, then we continued on to the deer reserve, an enclosed protected area which as been use to help re-populate deer in the mountains. We took a bus to another area and hiked to a rifugio where we enjoyed polenta with goulash for lunch.
3) A visit to Villa Welsperg in the Parco Nazionale di Paneveggio, Pale San Martino. We walked along some trails and around a man-made lake. A guide from the park pointed out and discussed the various wildflowers and also talked about the particular ecosystem and traditional sheep farming in that zone. While there, we also spent some time at the Casa del Parco nature museum and library. It would be a lovely place to spend a day as it was full of fun surprises. One section had books with all of the parts of the plants and flowers in the area. Another had woodcarvings of all of the trees and their component parts, there were also “books” of the various types of rock, plus drawers to pull out with birds nests and fossils.
Lunch was at Bar Larghetto. It was a big group, and some of them had a primo piatto (first course) of pasta, followed by a secondo piatto (second course) of meat. The Tandem Spirits have to be a bit careful of what we eat when we are going to be on a bus ride along curvy roads so we both just had a simple tagliatelle in tomato sauce
After lunch we drove to Mezzana. We had a tour of the charming, quirky little town where they had an historical museum, a display of nativities, fountains and elaborately painted woodpiles. We ended our visit with a walk to the artiginal brewery, Bionoc’, where we had a tour of the facility and tasted two beers. We also bought four bottles to take home.
Free Days
1) On our first free day we joined a group for a leisurely 6 km hike that left from the hotel, skirted the town and wound its way into the forest. We returned back to the hotel, showered and went into town for lunch. We found a small shop and had panini and beers.
2) We had hoped to be able to rent bikes during this week, and on Wednesday, we finally had our chance. We rented bikes from Skisport and booked a tour guide to take us on a nice ride.It always takes some time to get used to rented bikes, and rented mountain bikes in particular as they’re generally larger and heavier than the bikes we’re used to riding. After awhile we were peddling along without any problems. We did some riding in the forest and some on the roads. The roads were better for Virginia as she felt a bit unstable on some of the mountain trails. It was a beautiful day for cycling. We stopped for break at a rifugio for beers and a snack. We were out for most of the day.
3) Thursday was our last day. We took the funicular up the mountain and hiked to the rifugio Rosetta. The temperature was perfect, not at all cold, although there was snow on the ground in some areas. We made a mental note to bring our slip-on ice cleats that we picked up during our year in Michigan on our next green week. We didn’t venture up to a few spots because we were worried about slipping on the ice, especially on the way down. After a bit of exploring, we noticed the winds were changing and some dark clouds were blowing in so we hiked back to the lift. We did stop at the restaurant there for a sausage sandwich and beers before taking the funicular down.
Being Together with Our Colleagues
One of the things we really enjoy about our green weeks is the sense of camaraderie. After dinner people congregated either outside or in the lounge to talk, play cards, watch a soccer game or just sit and relax. James and a couple of other colleagues brought guitars and a ukulele, and it was fun to have them play both American and Italian popular songs. Even the people playing cards or watching a game would sing along.
Oh, and let’s not forget the delicious northern Italian cuisine in the mountains. Many of the dishes have an Austrian/Hungarian flair with a lot of goulash, venison, pork, polenta, potatoes and other specialties.
