Today is our last full day in Italy. Tomorrow we will be heading for Switzerland on the last leg of our journey. We’ve really enjoyed our time in Cortina. Our apartment has been perfect. Plenty of space for us, a nice balcony, a washer for our clothes and the location is great too. We are nice and close to everything we need to access and this place has an underground garage for us to park our car.

Today we decided to check out some of the cable cars that are near us to get up to good views of the surrounding area. We were thankful to wake up to absolutely beautiful blue skies with just a few puffy white clouds.

The Faloria cable car is literally across the street from us. Jacob bought our tickets online and it was supposed to be an easy matter of scanning a QR code and getting printed tickets, but the machine we needed to use was not in service so we had to go to the ticket counter for assistance. After getting our tickets, we stood in line for the cable car.

I was not thrilled because 1. these are not my favorite anyway and 2. it was completely packed and I was pretty sure that we were over the weight limit and the cable was going to snap and we were going to careen down the mountainous hillside.

By some miracle, we made it.

Once at the top (which was at 2,120 meters or 6,955 feet) we weren’t too sure what to do or what was up here. We looked a sign that pointed out some viewpoints and walked around the lodge that is up there. Jacob suggested that we walk up to the other Refugio. But between the elevation and my blistered heels, I was not up for it. So we just wandered a bit more on the lower trails and took in the sights. Because we wanted to catch another cable car on the other side of town, we headed back down.

On our route back down, we were the only two people in the cable car much to my relief!

When we got to the bottom, we walked across the street back to our apartment for a quick snack break. We also applied sunscreen. Then we were on our way. The next cable car was a short walk across town.

The weather today was beautiful and warm, the sun was shining brightly. This has been by far the warmest day we’ve had in Cortina, mid-70s and perfect!

Up next was the Tofana cable car. The first part is a ride on gondolas that are constantly coming through and you just have to hop onto them. They take you up to Col Druscie which is 1,778 meters (5,833 feet). Here there is a wine bar and observatory! We got off our gondola and then boarded a much larger cable car. From here we were headed up to Ra Valles which is 2,470 meters (8,103 feet). There isn’t too much open here right now but during the winter it has the highest pizzeria in the alps! We continued on from there to our next and final cable car that would take us to Tofana Di Mezzo which is at 3,244 meters (10,643 feet).

This final cable car was so high up it took us through the clouds.

Once we got out, it was chilly and I could feel the lack of oxygen with each breath I took. High altitude feels funny. Jacob and I both decided we were made for sea level. We sat at a bench for a moment, (don’t worry they serve coffee and pastries here too). We ate the snacks we brought and just waited a little bit for our bodies to acclimate to the high altitude. When we felt better, we took staircase up higher to a viewing point. There was signage that warned people that they should have proper equipment and special training for high altitude climbing to be up there. Ha!

The views were spectacular and it made it worth the trip!

We’d decided that we had done enough alpine mountain climbing for the day and made our way back to the cable car. Though it was cool up at 10,600 feet it was not so cold that either of us were uncomfortable in our t-shirts and shorts.

We took the cable car back down to Ra Valles and hopped off. Not much is going on at Ra Valles in the summer, but the views were still fantastic. This is where I started singing the hills are alive with the sound of music…. and Jacob said, “oh dear.”

As stated, there wasn’t much to do here so we caught the next cable car down to the next spot. We were keeping an eye on the clouds. We didn’t want to get caught up here during a storm (well 50% of us didn’t want to get caught up there). They close the cars during storms, so who knows how long it would take to get back down.

The next car took us back to Col Druscie. This is where the wine bar and the observatory are. There is also a playground for kids and a ton of lounge chairs out for people to sit in and relax. It was unbelieveable the difference we could both feel when we took in a breath of air. The air almost felt heavy, but in a good way!

From here it was time to get on our last jaunt down the mountain in the smaller gondolas. It was a beautiful journey down the mountain, well – I assume it was. I was mostly gripping a pole and staring at the ground.

Jacob said I need to get ready because we will be taking many of these once we get to Switzerland.

We made it back to our apartment in time to watch the afternoon torrential downpour from the comfort of our couch instead of huddling under a small overhang of a building.

We are planning to get pizza again for dinner to save on effort and dishes this evening. We have a final load of laundry to wash and things to pack up. Our drive to Grindelwald tomorrow will take about seven hours, so it is going to be a long day.

We are looking forward to our next AirBnB and our five nights in Switzerland. The weather looks good so far, so we hope it stays that way!

Tomorrow is also exciting because it is my dad’s 70th birthday. Happy birthday Dad!

Until then!