Photos from the Dolomites

[Lisa Nikodym]

Life has been busy lately, and I've only now gotten around to finishing my photos taken on vacation in the Dolomites of northern Italy last summer. Not many North Americans seem to know much about them, but they are some of the most spectacular mountains I've ever seen (and I've seen a lot  ).  I know a couple of people here in the forums want to see them, so here they are:

Dolomites photos

(Plus a few from Verona, the nearby city we flew into.)
I've put the better ones in each section first, so you can stop when you get bored.  

The Dolomites are full of hiking trails, and full of lifts (which are ski lifts in the winter) to help you gain altitude with minimal effort, and great food (a mixture of Italian & German).

My favorite shot from the trip, as an appetizer:


Enjoy!
Lisa

[vandevanterSH]

That is very nice, it shows the pale, pink color of the mountains.  I have only been to the Dolomites in the Winter to ski and I don't remember the delicate colors being seen so well.  I should try a summer trip.

Steve

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Life has been busy lately, and I've only now gotten around to finishing my photos taken on vacation in the Dolomites of northern Italy last summer. Not many North Americans seem to know much about them, but they are some of the most spectacular mountains I've ever seen (and I've seen a lot  ).  I know a couple of people here in the forums want to see them, so here they are:

Dolomites photos

(Plus a few from Verona, the nearby city we flew into.)
I've put the better ones in each section first, so you can stop when you get bored.  

The Dolomites are full of hiking trails, and full of lifts (which are ski lifts in the winter) to help you gain altitude with minimal effort, and great food (a mixture of Italian & German).

My favorite shot from the trip, as an appetizer:
 
I'll check 'em out Thursday.

Eric

[wolfnowl]

Nice work, Lisa!  Thanks for sharing them...

Mike.

[fredjeang]

Very nice!
Lisa, did you use the 4/3 Panasonic in this series?
It will be nice to hear your evaluation on field.

And about the food...an italo-german mixed?...
I guess italian for the soul, german for altitude and cold.

Fred,

[francois]

Lisa,
Very inspiring images. I'm always fond of your travel photos and those ones are really outstanding.

[Lisa Nikodym]

Thanks for the kind words!

Sorry, Fred, I bought the GH1 only a couple of weeks ago, and haven't spent nearly enough time with it yet to be comfortable with it.  These photos were taken with a Nikon D300 (except the infrared ones with a converted D200).

As I understand the history of this area, it was part of Austria before WWI and part of Italy afterwards.  It's still very bilingual (plus an obscure third language,  Ladin, spoken in a few valleys), and the food and culture are a mix of Austrian/German and Italian (probably more the former).  A dish I had many places there that I haven't seen anywhere else was German-style beef goulash served with Italian-style polenta.  Yum!

Lisa

[futura]

Lovely set of shots Lisa. I would love to spend some time camping and trekking in the dolomites one day. Did you manage to cover a few trails? Would be grateful if you could share some of your itinerary in the area.

[Lisa Nikodym]

Thanks, futura.  Most of the photos were taken from trails.  We stayed in hotels in two towns (Selva/Wolkenstein in Val Gardena, and Cortina d'Ampezzo), and did a long day hike most days.  The full-day or half-day hikes we did were:
Around the base of Sassolungo
Puez Altiplano & Vallunga
Up the Rosengarten/Catinaccio inner valley
Around the top of the Sella massif
Up the ridge behind Cinque Torri
Tre Cime circuit
Into the Cadini group
Out from Faloria (above Cortina)

I had trouble finding much in the way of good hiking information.  The best I could find was the book "Shorter Walks in the Dolomites" by Gillian Price (Cicerone Guides).  Most of our hikes were from that book.  Don't let the title fool you; the book is full of looong all-day hikes.  It's called that because there is a companion guide that has multi-day treks called "Walking in the Dolomites".

It was a great trip!

Lisa

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

I finally got a chance to go through the Dolomites photos, Lisa. Wow!!! Utterly stunning! Makes me hungry for goulash and polenta.

The foggy scene of the Rosengarten is to die for. Wonderful stuff.

Eric

[futura]

Many thanks for the info, looks like a trip I will need to build up my fitness for!

[Lisa Nikodym]

Thanks, Eric, I'm glad you enjoyed them.  We didn't have the greatest weather for many of our days there, and the day we were hiking the Rosengarten there was intermittant heavy rain and dense clouds (which produced that foggy photo you liked).  Late in the day at the lower elevations, however, it started clearing up, and that's when I got most of the good photos from that day.  Our Cadini hike day was like that too, where we were dodging fog and drizzle for most of the day.   And our Puez/Vallunga hike too...  A local there told us that we had unusually bad weather that week...

At least there are "rifugios" (restaurant/lodges) here & there along the trails, which were convenient to retreat to when the weather turned too bad.  And sometimes the photos of mountains mixed with fog turn out to be some of the better photos.

We want to go back again sometime in September, and hopefully get better weather.  (We were there in very early July, not peak season yet.  There was still snow on some of the higher trails that stopped us in a couple of places)

Lisa

[Wolfman]

Hey Lisa....... very nice images from Dolomiti......... brings back memories from my trip....... Vallunga looks amazing.

[kal]

Some really beautiful pictures here... mostly of places I know quite well.

You should definitely check the (old) books by Karl Felix Wolff who collected all sorts of legends about those mountains, That would make you see them in an even better light.

Try this as a starting point: http://www.ilregnodeifanes.it/inglese/intro.htm (I am in no way connected with the site, just google'd for KFW)