Throughout the summer, I'll be taking you to the places that have shaped my personal history and that of Verbano Cusio Ossola. I'll do it on a mountain bike, but this time the bicycle will be merely the means of transport. The real journey will be through a land I've always known and which, perhaps for this very reason, continues to amaze me even today.
"Lakes and Mountains" was born with a simple goal: to showcase the VCO region for what it truly is. A unique area in the Alpine landscape, encompassing within just a few kilometers worlds that elsewhere seem to belong to different regions. Here, you can set out from the shores of a lake, cross forests and mountain pastures, follow trails that tell the story of centuries of mountain life, and find yourself, in a short time, at the foot of glaciers and the highest peaks of the Alps.
We'll explore trails that start from the lakes and climb towards the mountains. We'll discover a history of partisan struggle and trenches built to defend the territory from a possible Austrian invasion during the First World War. These places have now transformed into extraordinary environments, where you can experience endless panoramas from the saddle of your mountain bike.
But it would be reductive to talk only about trails, panoramas, and itineraries. This project was born from the desire to tell the story of a land through the stories it holds, the people who live there, and the places that have helped shape my way of seeing the world.
The land I call home
Such an important journey could only start from home.
From West Cusio, along those trails that for many represent a marginal part of the province, yet which preserve one of the most authentic souls of the VCO. It is here that the connection between lake and mountain is most powerfully evident. In just a few kilometers, you move from water to ridges, from villages to mountain pastures, traversing a nature that has retained much of its authenticity.
Here, there are no purpose-built trails, artificial banks, or lines designed to impress on social media. Here, you pedal according to the logic of the mountain. You cross Il Passaggio, ride along ancient connecting routes, and still breathe the energy of a life that for centuries has centered on pastures, woods, and livestock.
Every time I return to these parts, I find something hard to explain. Perhaps it's what many simply call home.
The Mountains of Resistance
From these mountains another journey will also begin: one into memory.
The Resistance played a significant role in my personal development and my understanding of the world. For this reason, we'll explore some of the places that symbolized that experience, attempting to explore its deeper meaning.
We'll start from Alpe Camasca and the places associated with Captain Beltrami. Places that still preserve the memory of men who chose to sacrifice everything for something greater than themselves.
A story that is too often told only through dates and events, forgetting the human and symbolic value it continues to convey.
Where history meets the mountain
The journey will then continue towards Massone, the mountain that separates Cusio from Ossola.
Here we will encounter the Bara Fort and the works of the Cadorna Line, evidence of a defensive system built during the First World War and later become part of the history of the Republic of Ossola.
From there, we'll move towards Verbano and the Zeda mountains, the scene of some of the most dramatic moments of the partisan struggle. These places still carry the weight of memory and, at the same time, offer some of the most fascinating itineraries in the entire Alpine region.
Massone and Zeda, however, share another characteristic. They are mountains that don't yield easily. They require effort, time, and determination. They are places where you often have to get off your bike, push it, carry it on your shoulders, and conquer every meter of descent.
It's here that the journey will begin to take on a different dimension. No longer just an exploration of the territory, but a search for an authentic mountain, one that still demands something from those who wish to cross it.
The roots of my MTB
After the story will come the roots of my experience on fat tires.
I'll do it with Alessandro Botta and the Lago Maggiore MTB School, heir to that Lago Maggiore God Bike where my mountain biking story and that of many other bikers in the area began.
It will be an opportunity to retrace the years of competitions, friendships, and shared challenges, but also to tell the story of an area that perfectly represents the essence of Verbano: a place where the lake and the mountains coexist in an almost unrepeatable way.
Looking for flow where it doesn't exist
Val Formazza will probably represent the most personal chapter of the entire project.
Here, the trails and mountains intertwine with some of the most distant memories of my childhood. I'll recall the days spent in Riale, the picnics organized with a simplicity that now seems from another era, the pasta prepared in the morning, the coffee sipped in the shade, and those wooden tables that, thinking back today, still make me smile, wondering how they managed to support my grandfather's weight.
My grandfather, who had experienced the war and the Resistance much more closely than I ever could.
Perhaps this is also why the Formazza Valley holds a special place in my memory. Because in those meadows and among those mountains coexist the most carefree memories of childhood and the story of a generation that experienced sacrifices and hardships that we can barely imagine today.
But the Formazza I'm going to tell you about won't just be the one of memories.
It will also be the most severe and authentic mountain that this journey will encounter.
Here, a different, more intimate and personal quest will begin. A quest that involves cycle mountaineering, fatigue, and silence. Along trails that often force you to slow down, get off your bike, carry it on your shoulders, and conquer every meter of descent.
These are paths that require attention, respect, and clarity. Places where there are no shortcuts and where mistakes can have real consequences.
This is where I will try to find flow where flow does not exist.
Not the kind of perfectly shaped trails or lines built to be traveled at high speed. But the kind born from the balance between man and mountain. The kind found by dancing on the edge, seeking fluidity on paths shaped by time, by melting snow, by the passage of animals and the men who have traversed these mountains for centuries.
The Blinnenhorn, the Blind Horn, will represent the high point of this research.
A mountain that perhaps better than any other represents the profound meaning of the VCO: splendid, wild, and hidden. A peak that doesn't truly reveal itself until you reach it.
Just like this land.
Return to the starting point
Finally the return will come.
I'll return to Pogno, to my friends the Gufi, where my journalism journey began. If I can recount this journey today, it's also thanks to their belief that a small town made up of taps, without a lake, without any great mountains, and not very Instagrammable, could nevertheless become a hub for Italian mountain biking.
Perhaps this is the thread that unites all the stages of Lakes and Mountains: the ability to look beyond appearances. Behind a path, behind a mountain, behind a story or a person.
A summer between lakes and mountains
As I write these lines I realize that Lakes and Mountains has become something different from what I initially imagined.
I was thinking of sharing some of the most beautiful places in Verbano-Cusio-Ossola. I was thinking of creating a journey through trails, panoramas, and mountains.
But the more the path takes shape, the more I realize that this project is about much more.
It speaks of the authentic mountains of Western Cusio and the trails that still retain the flavor of exploration. It speaks of the memory of the Resistance and of the people who helped build the freedom we enjoy today. It speaks of the great history that runs through places like the Massone, the Cadorna Line, and the Zeda.
It talks about the mountain biking that shaped me, the friendships born on the trails, the races, the brawls, and the people who helped grow this sport on Lake Maggiore.
It speaks of the highlands of the Formazza Valley, where effort once again has meaning and where flow is found not in perfect trails but in the balance between man, bike, and mountain.
It's about the most instinctive and fun mountain biking. The kind of riding in bike parks, with its drawn-out turns, jumps, and days spent simply playing with a bike.
But above all it talks about people.
Because every path, every mountain, and every story we encounter along the way exists thanks to those who lived them before us and continue to live them today.
Perhaps this is the true richness of Verbano Cusio Ossola. The ability to encompass, in a relatively small area, completely different worlds. Lakes and glaciers. History and future. Hiking and bike parks. Silence and adrenaline. Memory and discovery.
Throughout the summer I will try to tell them in the way I know best: by pedaling.
