3 days geo-tour in Val Maira

03-07-2015

The "ciciu"

I met with the rest of the geo-touring group at Villar S. Costanzo (CN), where our 3-days started with a visit to the Ciciu del Villar Nature Reserve, a typical formation of this area. Their particular "mushroom" shape comes from the erosion of the clay base, leaving the top, made of harder metamorphic rock typical of here and the Susa Valley.
We then moved on to our lunch destination, after a brief stop to check the old separation between the African and the European plates, that runs just here :-)
I left my car there and teamed up with another woman who was also driving alone and we drove towards Elva, a beautiful little village famous for the old Hair Gathering trade. 

> Here's an extract I translated from the Museo dj Pels (Museum of Hair) webpage [http://tinyurl.com/o8y4k44] :
      The Museum of "Pels" (hair) of Elva is linked to the tradition of "Pelassiers" (gatherers of hair), lasting more than a century between the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century.
The pelassiers started from Elva in the early autumn and traveled to Lombardy, Veneto and Friuli looking for women and girls willing to get their hair cut in exchange for a few coins, a piece of cloth or a scarf.
Back in Elva, the hair went into family workshops to be combed and separated according to colour, length and thickness. After this, the hair was collected in braids and sent to wholesalers, who made precious wigs sold to Lords and aristocratic ladies throughout Europe.
The Museum of Pels, hosted in the nineteenth-century House of the Sundial, collects historical material provided by the inhabitants of Elva: vintage photos, tools of the trade, evidence collected directly from the pelassiers, even the laces, jewels, and scarves that were used to convince women to barter their hair. The museum also shows a wonderful documentary by Fredo Valla titled "The road of hair" with interviews of the pelassiers who used to walk these mountains. <

We reached our lunch destination at about 2.00pm - La Sousta dal Col, near the Colle S.Giovanni, with 12°C... a refreshing change from the humid heat of the plains...
The food was very nice :-)

After lunch we drove to the Pass in the pouring rain, so ... no panorama! After retracing our steps, we made another stop for a short walk un a steep hill, just facing Mt. Bettone, where our excellent guide Enrico Collo, an expert of the Valley's geology, showed us the different rock formations.

Teepee tents at Lou Dahu

We then proceeded to Marmora, further along the Valley, were we have our accommodation for the 2 nights. I'm sharing the room with another member of the tour, and we're staying in a campsite (Lou Dahu) that also has bungalows, rooms and Indian teepee tents - the overall setting is nice, but they have a dodgy dog policy: no dogs are allowed even when all occupants of the room agree for its staying… dogs are not even allowed in the campsite area - really weird, when there were no problems in the HOTEL where some other members of our group were staying… so our companion dog Gina stayed in the hotel where her mother was, instead of in the room with her grandad ;-p




After a light dinner in Osteria della Croce Bianca, in Marmora (food ok, but the staff seemed rather out of place), we went for a walk in the night looking for stars. And stars we saw - Antares, Vega, Altair, the Scorpion constellation and even Saturn was visible. A lot of fireflies guided our way back :-)

04-07

Day 2 started with a flimsy breakfast at the campsite -cappuccino and croissant - I reckon they're a bit stingy in these parts... even if I think a bread, butter and jam choice, would have worked out better for us and cheaper for them. Never mind.

Today we spent the day walking - we started with the Gardetta plateau, where our guide Enrico found Triassic dinosaur prints under some fossilised ocean ripple - quite fascinating! We also learnt that green-yellow lichens  grow on silica rocks, whereas orange lichens grow on limestone rocks. 

One of the dino prints

Ancient ocean and beach ripple, on multiple layers

We continued our walk to the Gardetta Refuge for our lunch, where they gave us polenta (thick, solidified cornmeal porridge), the typical mountain food that can be served with stew, sausages or melted cheese and butter.

Edelweiss

Flowers in full bloom

A proud marmot

After lunch, another short walk up to the Gardetta Pass, were there still were some patches of snow. All along the walk we enjoyed the flowers in bloom, including edelweiss, a protected alpine flower. On the way we also spotted a few marmots, some even posing for pix ;-)






Rosie joined us at the campsite and for dinner, to be there for our last day of touring. It was a nice extra to my trip :-)

A view over the valley with an ancient glacial lake

Back to base, we repeated last night experience over dinner, if possible made even worse by the insufficient portions... All in all it's like being on an all-carbs diet: there's always very little vegetables -unfortunately quite typical of Piedmontese traditional cuisine- and the meal is largely based on first course of pasta or rice, and a meat second course, mainly roasts with a few (count them) over-greasy potatoes or carrots. They also favour starters, usually quite tasty, but there again you get a rather unhealthy mixture of meat-fish-cheese with sauces and other fats, with a few vegs, usually cooked...

05-07

This morning we headed to Rocca Provenzale, that incidentally resembles the spine of a giant dinosaur... The morning was really glorious, and we got the chance of learning yet something more about these mountains and their ancient past.

We had lunch at the Maira Springs - I must say the best food we had so far, they even cooked a seitan stew for vegetarians! and we have been told they don't usually do catering... 

A travertine cave

On the way back we visited a formation of travertine caves, also typical of the area.

When we reached our cars late in the afternoon the trip was over, so we all parted with a gift from Enrico, a nice booklet about the geology of the Valley and the promise to exchange photos from the trip.
With Rosie we went for dinner at the Tano di Grich (the Cricket's Den), in S.Michele Prazzo, one of our favourite establishments of this Valley, where we always enjoy good food :-)
_._._._._

I spent a very nice 3 days, learning a lot about geology and the formation of the earth from millions of years ago, I totally enjoyed the walks and the lessons, and the nice group that gathered.

Coming back to the plains we found torrid heat, I guess it's what India must be like most of the time, very humid and high temperatures... we could get very little proper sleep!

For info about geological tours: www.geoturismo.it (in Italian)
[for more pix: http://tinyurl.com/pyhwquu]