“Estate” by Jovanotti was playing on the radio, the thermostat read 38℃, the humidity made the air heavy, and the lines of cars were endless. In the midst of that ruckus of exhaust and heat, we had as our only source of survival half a bottle of Fanta and a ham sandwich. We looked at each other and promised that next summer we would go to Valle D’Aosta instead.  

A region that we often only call upon in the winter months when we feel like descending, as Rita Pavone sings in “Cucuzzolo Della Montagna”, “from the mountaintop with a pair of skis”, but that secretly has even more to offer in the summer season, when one can discover Val Ferret on horseback, walk at the foot of a glacier without freezing and take a dip in the beautiful waterfalls of Lillaz in Cogne or the Blue Lake in Val d’Ayas.