Val Gardena December 2009 Report

Dear Geno, thanks for your nice report.

I'm going to Kastelruth at the end of this month and I saw that the skipass is valid for Alpe di Siusi and Val Gardena. When you are up there it's possible to go from one place to another with the lifts or you have to go down to the village take the car ang go to the other village? Thanks in advance for your help.

Excellent stuff Geno. I had to read it back in an Ozzy accent for it to make total sense!
BTW, whats a sook?

Val Gardena, Arabba and Selva have been somewhere I intend to go for a while now, and those pictures certainly do it justice. You were seriously lucky with the weather as much of Europe has been struggling before Xmas.

2011 might be the time for a visit from me.

Excellent stuff Geno. I had to read it back in an Ozzy accent for it to make total sense!
BTW, whats a sook?

Val Gardena, Arabba and Selva have been somewhere I intend to go for a while now, and those pictures certainly do it justice. You were seriously lucky with the weather as much of Europe has been struggling before Xmas.

2011 might be the time for a visit from me.

Tony_H wrote:Excellent stuff Geno. I had to read it back in an Ozzy accent for it to make total sense!
BTW, whats a sook?

A sook is a crybaby. Somebody who throws the spits the dummy, throws the toys outta the cot etc.

PS - Tony, I would have thought you have already been to Arabba or Val Gardena. Aren't you the guy who always goes skiing in Italy?

geno68 wrote:

Tony_H wrote:Tony, I would have thought you have already been to Arabba or Val Gardena. Aren't you the guy who always goes skiing in Italy?

Nope, I have only been to Sauze d'Oulx twice.

www  New and improved me

Juan Ricardo wrote:Dear Geno, thanks for your nice report.

I'm going to Kastelruth at the end of this month and I saw that the skipass is valid for Alpe di Siusi and Val Gardena. When you are up there it's possible to go from one place to another with the lifts or you have to go down to the village take the car ang go to the other village? Thanks in advance for your help.

Yep skipass is valid all the way to Austria actually. From the Suisi\Seiser plateau, in theory, you could ski around the Sella Ronda and back but you'd have to be a bloody good skier and have good conditions otherwise you would run out of time I think. You would also have to walk about 500m from the bottom of the Suisi->Ortisei gondola to the escalators in Ortisei village which then take you to the Seceda gondola. The Seceda gondola then gets you up to the high Northern slopes of Val Gardena. From there you could ski down to Christina.....
All do-able, simply a question of time and stamina. That said, the Suisi\Seiser plateau is plenty big in it's own right and would keep most skiers of all levels entertained for ages.

From Kastelruth you need to take the bus or car to Suis\Seiser village and get the blue gondola up to Alpe di Suisi. You could then ski across the plateau and get the red gondola down to Ortisei\St Ulrich. The final leg to the gondola is uphill so you need to take a 5 minute chair ride up.

However, it would be much quicker to drive the 10 to 15 minutes (bus is probably half an hour I guess) to Val Gardena and park at one of the 3 villages and get ones of the many lifts up from there.
I think there is free parking around. The Suis\Seiser carpark definitely is free.

Print these on a big piece of A3, memorise and take with you.
http://www.skimap.info/europe/italy/val_gardena-alpe_di_siusi/ski_map_val_gardena-alpe_di_siusi.jpg
http://www.valgardena.it/download/gardena/pdf/maps/Wintermap_Val_Gardena_Groeden_2009.pdf

However, you can get a massive poster from the skipass office (free). They also give you a good map of the Suisi area.

More info here;
http://www.skivalgardena.com/ortisei-skiing.php

Kastelruth is a nice village and has quite a good range of shops, ski places and supermarkets for it's small size. If you have a car then the whole of Val Gardena is easily accessible. Forecast for this week is for another 25cm of snow and they already have tons of packed powder, so snow coverage won't be a problem. Good luck and have a blast. It would be good if you let us know how it goes.

Surely! Thanks again for your help.

No prob. When I say skipass is valid all the way to Austria I am assuming you get the Dolomiti pass. Costs a few Euros more than the local pass.