From Arco To The Dolomites

Northern Italy is pretty great. Per Olie's recommendation we made our way to Arco, a quaint city nestled in a valley in the Provence of Trento. It's an awesome area with climbing everywhere!

This is the first climbing area we explored. Some fun and short single pitch routes with plenty of shade to keep us from overheating. 

Ignoring the "No camping" signs, we found a great pullout to spend the night with an epic view. Can't complain about this spot...

This is the wall we decided to climb in the morning. We found a slew of fun routes at all sorts of grades and styles. A successful day at the crag indeed (didn't take any photos though, too busy being a safe belayer). 

It was quite hot and we decided an hour at the lake was necessary for comfort and cleanliness. 

The next day was a rest day as we were both climbing pretty hard. As planned, I absolutely had to try the pizza while in Italy. We found a decent place by the lake. 

Uh oh! Another food photo... What is this? Instagram??? The pizza was decent. 

The next morning we decided to move on. It was so hot and humid the sleep wasn't very easy to obtain. Plus we were both eager to see the dolomites. 

We stopped along the way for some sightseeing. In Bolzano we stopped at the archeological museum that was home to the world famous "Ice Man"; the preserved remains of a 5,000 year old man that was found nearby in the mountains in 1991. 

This is merely a recreation although we actually got to see the real remains, which felt a bit voyeuristic and weird. A fun and educational stop though!

And another Gothic Church in case you haven't seen enough yet. 

AAAAANNNNDD... The Dolomites!

(Well, at least the start of the Dolomites)

Once again... A decent place to spend the night...

Today we wanted to find a nice hike. By time we got to town, did some research, picked a hike, and starting hiking, it began raining. We tolerated 20 minutes of windy raining hiking before heading back to the car and eventually into town where I could order a cold beer and Camille could draw and paint. 

Tomorrow should have better weather and we hope to do a nice via ferrata that should end in some nice views of the region.