| We had a free weekend and so decided to pack up our tent and drive into the Alps. About an hour and a half from Turin, you reach the base of Monviso - by far the most dramatic mountain in the region, and famous for its use by Paramount Pictures. We pitched our tent at around 1800m. It was a little bit more chilly than down in Turin, but no worse than Britain in August! From where we camped, we had a fabulous panorama of the immediate mountain range and valley below. |
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| Monviso's day job! (It does look like that, only from a different angle.) |
| Polenta with sausages in Barolo wine and porcini mushrooms - just what you need to warm the insides while up a mountain. |
| The dawn coming over the cloud-covered valley below us. |
| And the sun creeping onto the mountain above us. |
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| Breakfast with a view. |
| After which we set off for our walk... |
| ...the first objective was Pian del Re at 2000m, and the source of the River Po... |
| ...which doesn't really exist of course, because there are lots of tributaries, but at this point it is still very obviously the Po. |
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| We continued to climb up to a series of lakes at cloud level. |
| Our highest point, around 2300m, and a bit close to Monviso... but we decided to leave the scaling of the summit for another day. It was spectacular enough as it was! |
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| Like good British walkers, we had a picnic lunch by a lake and a snooze in the sunshine afterwards. Heading back down a different route, we had a good view of our final objective - our tent awaiting our return. |
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| We cooked at the tent and huddled up for warmth. |
| The following day we visited the nearby Abbey of Staffarda. |
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| And in the afternoon to the beautiful hill town of Saluzzo... |
| ...where The Swingle Singers were giving a free concert in the main street. We arrived early and got ourselves at the front of a massive crowd. |
| The London based a cappella group entertained as ever and the atmosphere was fantastic. |
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 clip loading - please be patient, and allow active content if it is blocked."A Fifth of Beethoven" | |
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| clip loading - please be patient, and allow active content if it is blocked. A medley of "Flying High" by Jem and "When September Ends" by Green Day | |
| By the end, the place was absolutely packed, and the final encore of "Bella Ciao" brought standing ovations. A great end to a great weekend. |