The Dolomites are a different kind of Alps. Where the French and Swiss mountains are rounded and massive, the Dolomite peaks are vertical — sheer pale limestone towers that rise from the valley floors with an almost theatrical drama. Skiing the Sella Ronda circuit through the Alta Badia, Val Gardena, Val di Fassa and Arabba areas puts you in the middle of this landscape for an entire day, and the scenery is consistently astonishing.
We came to the Italian Dolomites in January 2022 partly because the French resorts were still uncertain with Covid restrictions, and partly because we’d always meant to make the trip. The Sella Ronda circuit — roughly 40km of marked piste connecting the four valleys around the Sella massif — can be done clockwise or anticlockwise and takes most of a day at a comfortable pace. The mountain refuges along the route serve pasta and risotto that remind you that you are, in fact, in Italy and not France.
The Dolomites were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2009 and you understand why when you’re in them. The rock colour shifts from white to pink to orange as the light changes across the day — the phenomenon known as Enrosadira — and at sunset the towers glow in a way that makes every photograph look slightly too good to be true. The skiing is good; the scenery is extraordinary. We’ll be back.