We decided to have a day in the Dolomites - they felt different to the Alps somehow, no idea why. Our helpful receptionist gave us a map of car tours for the whole region, unusually with the description in English. I say "unusually" as we're a rare breed here - they reckon they only get around 10 GB visitors each year, so we’re feeling pretty special.

We dipped in & out of the described tours as the fancy took & did a loop to the north through passes, up valleys and down hairpins, all with great vistas at every turn: villages perched mid hill, grey rocks poking through the greenery, craggy-topped mountains soaring skywards surrounded by mist, turquoise lakes like Lago di Stramentizzo nestling in the trees. 

Lunch was at the top of the Lavaze Pass, surrounded by those craggy rocks and a lake; we ate while we watched the clouds roll in & the rain start - yet again! The clouds continued all the way down the Adige valley, but didn't last long & we traversed Bolzano in the sun again - a very busy place crammed full of students on bikes & scooters, seen mostly because we made several wrong turnings!

Turning south we travelled a wine road once again, although this should really have been the Wine and Fruit Road - mile upon mile of vines & fruit trees. All the signposts were labelled in both German & Italian as this area was formerly part of Germany, & even 75+ years later the German names are first.

They put vines on the most inaccessible slopes here. We misread a turning once again & ended up crossing a huge hill on what we thought was a very narrow road - until it went through a village & became an almost impossible road JUST wider than the car & through the village of Altavalle – the aptly named High Valley I was sweating away, & I wasn't even driving! R is my hero.

We stopped at some rocks called the Pyramids of Segonzano - very unusual formations, more like pinnacles than pyramids, but some have caps like hats, some are like organ pipes, some resemble elongated mushrooms and others are more like very tall thin pyramids. They are glacial deposits & have been eroded by water over the millennia and very unusual to look at. 

There is an educational path with signage in English, so we wandered between the lower level ones and learned all about the pyramids. It was very hot though, and although there was a challenging uphill walk, the lungs & the hip gave out & I had to give in & take pics lower down. Fortunately there was a bar at the bottom, where we had expensive but well-deserved drinks - €4 EACH for a lime & soda - they're 20p in the Bay Horse pub near my house!!