Val Malvaglia

Road trip. To celebrate getting the heating fixed in our old Range Rover, we decided to have a day out in Tessin. We had no fixed plan when we set off, but with map in hand, we set off to drive over the Lukmanier pass to Tessin. It’s the only pass that crosses the Alps north south, which generally stays open all year. There was plenty on snow on top, and the forest in Blenio looked lovely in the snow. It took about 2.5 hours to get down to Malvaglia, a pretty little Ticino town, with the nicest public toilets I’ve seen in Switzerland which had been freshly painted in mint green. We were really hungry, and luckily the restaurant was serving take away pizza, oh, it was delicious, Buffalo mozzerellla and cherry tomatoes with basil. After sitting in the sun in the town square eating our pizza, we set of up a very steep road with many hairpin bends up the Val Malvaglia. What a stunning drive, past so many stone and wood built villages which cling on to steep forested slopes. We parked the car just after the lake, and found a circular walk that would lead us through some of these amazing little villages like Medra and Dandrio. We got up to Anzano a hamlet at 1330m, with the most amazing views back to the valley and to the snow covered peaks Rheinquellhorn and Cima Rossa. The path led steeply down past the settlement Pannadich, which stars in the blip.
Altogether we walked about 7km, and up 400m, taking just over 2 hours. Back at the car it was really hot. We pretty much headed straight home, through the Gotthard tunnel, absolutely no traffic, back to the cold and rather drizzly north!
A thoroughly enjoyable day, hope to come back to explore and hike in some more of the amazing valleys of Tessin.