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It's time to go up, Alta Formazza, city of Busto


The arrival of summer has partially melted the snow that fell abundantly in the last winter. It's time to go up, and return to breathe the thin air of the glaciers, listening to the unique sound of silence. A harmony that fills your mind and transports you far away. The weather in these lands it has a different trend, it is calculated in experiences, not in hours and minutes. We are back in Val Formazza, one of those hidden pearls, a unique place of incomparable beauty, which could compete in a particular race with other more noble highlands, without fear of disfiguring, but then why it does not appear among the most sought-after destinations of the biker ? Why is it not among the meccas of MTB? This is another story, which will be worth investigating.

Short stop to observe a helicopter that seems to be looking for someone who is unlucky than us

We start from Riale, which we have already had the opportunity to visit often in both summer and winter versions. Turning on the internet, Strava and any other site, I did not find information on this descent, the refuge is named everywhere, the Citta di Busto is one of the busiest in this valley, but there is no information on its cycling, yet during other excursions that humpback looked very inviting. As I said, the departure is from Riale, meadows, church on the hill and all the rest, make this outpost of civilization a magical place, but today you go up unknown paths, so this time I pass my mind a little higher. In the projects, the first part is on gippabile, up to the Bettelmatt plain, where the cows graze producing the delicious alpine fat that bears the name of the plateau.

A lot of snow forces us to change the climb

But this winter a lot of snow fell and an avalanche interrupted the road, a section of 15 / 20Mt of snow with a nice skiable slope, but we don't talk about crossing it with the bike on your shoulder, so you go back down, go up again. a path with a maximum slope and you return to the gippabile, a game of about an hour. Then you arrive in the plain, in other places around this plateau they would have built fantastic videos and stories, take Scotland, combine a pinch of the dolomites and put a couple of glaciers as a backdrop and you will approach what is the Bettelmatt plateau.

The Bettlemat plain
The last stretch towards the city of Busto

From here begins the real tour. Continue until the road climbs, to my right the descent from Gries, another bad place to go, in front of me instead begins the path of Gionata. I will discomfort Caron demon with eyes of bragia, to describe what the unsuspecting biker will wait for: leave every hope or you who enter, so Dante would describe this moment, from here you go up for 400 meters of difference in height of portage, portage and again portage, only the last meters can be pedaled, leaving at least the satisfaction of reaching the refuge with two strokes of the pedal.  

In view of the refuge

No need to gild the pill, this is certainly one of the reasons that made adventurers give up. So bike on your shoulder, lots of patience and off you go. One step after another, the slow and rhythmic rhythm helps to climb, I always remember the useful advice of the mountaineers, climb slowly, breathe steadily and look only in front of you. Every now and then I stop to observe the landscape and there is a single adjective to describe it, FANTASTIC!  The path stands out along a wide donkey's back, enters and exits a valley eroded over the millennia by the ice that was at home here, a path almost always overhanging but suggestive like few others. The people I meet look at me curiously, they don't know that behind that apparent effort there is a mind that is already imagining the descent, the lines, the advances, where to take the photos and everything else.

A stretch of the splendid descent from the city refuge of Busto

Because what I had only anticipated at the beginning is that if the climb is a journey into the underworld of fatigue, reversing it this path was designed by the best of trail builders, nature. A trail just over a meter wide, constant slope, smooth surface and precise curves. But in the meantime we go up, the sign at the base gave 1h30 'to the refuge, in the end it will be much less but that's okay. In front of us the Sabbioni dam, below us another path that I decided to visit on my excursion with overnight stay in bivouac next time. In front of the large and still full Arbola glacier, and finally the descent that calls me with a persuasive voice as the sirens of the iliad called Ulysses to them. It is useless to dwell on great descriptions, soft focus, dance and palate of enjoyment, a fantastic descent, to be faced with a clear mind and with the desire to have fun on the bike, to do without exaggerating with speed, this is a path also frequented by hikers and therefore it is important to always have full control of the vehicle. The possibility of anticipating and predicting the presence of pedestrians, in order not to scare them or risk accidents is fundamental. But the descent is incredible, while this article goes to print I will have traveled it 3 times high with different itineraries. Then you return to the plain described above and from there the second descent of the day starts.

The second descent of the day towards the Morasco dam

I know it well and I was expecting it, here the bottom changes, there is a little slope, many stones, but when you pick up the rhythm the ballet starts again, a different rhythm, more agitated, stones, drops, closed sections, a line to improvise meter after meter, always with an eye to pedestrians. If the descent from the City of bust is similar to an elegant Strauss waltz, this is comparable to a Taranta. Then you go back to the dam, the desire to go back is great, but today the game is over, you slowly return to normal mode, until the next adventure.



Written by

[email protected] Mountain bike travel editor and expert. Chiropractor and personal trainer, for years following some of the strongest national interpreters of enduro mtb.

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