Calestro - Zernone - Somasaccia

Introduction

Beautiful and very panoramic tour that ascends the glacial terraces of the Val Bregaglia, dotted with villages and isolated huts amidst chestnut and birch forests. Opposite, to the south, an unforgettable view opens up of the area's most famous mountains: Pizzo Badile, Pizzo Cengalo, the Sciore and all the minor peaks of Val Bondasca. 

Description

From the car park, following the tourist arrows for "Savogno", you take a tarmac road that soon reaches the sports field in the locality of Motta; in the space between the road travelled so far and the football pitch, the path to follow branches off. Walking up and down between dry stone walls and terracing, you walk westwards and, after a few hundred metres, reach a fork in the road: turn right and climb up into the chestnut grove. You come to a junction with a forest track (a continuation of the sports field road that leads to Savogno), finding the mule track again near a ruined hut; on a splendidly stepped surface, with regular hairpin bends that are never too steep in the chestnut wood, you come to the base of a rocky wall: above it extend the vast pastures that are the destination of this excursion. With a wide turn from left to right, you climb back up the difference in altitude and, with an overhanging staircase, reach the first clearings of Calestro 1100 m approx. Now the trail continues with gentle ups and downs joining the various clusters of dwellings, all more or less abandoned; just beyond the last and lowest hut, the track plunges into the wild gorge of the Zernone torrent. The path, which is clearly visible and in good condition, plunges into a gully with narrow hairpin bends until it reaches the bottom about 200 metres further down; for a short distance, follow the stream until a bridge allows you to cross it. A few hairpin bends through a bright birch forest lead to the hamlet of Montesetto: from here and up to the Somasaccia meadow 1072 m, it is one splendid walk through wide, flat meadows. From Somasaccia, you return to the valley along a beautiful mule track with stairs and steps, sometimes carved into ledges and always well protected by steel cable handrails. In a few tens of minutes, you are in sight of the houses of Dogana (a hamlet of Villa di Chiavenna) 683 m near the state border: having reached the state road, follow it for a few hundred metres, returning shortly to the car park near the bridge. The route of the excursion in winter conditions is subject to certain precautions: some settled snow is necessary because all the rocky crags underneath have a strong tendency to dump even modest amounts of wet snow. The descent of the Zernone gully could be prohibitive: consider the possibility of having to use crampons. The return to the valley from Somasaccia is subject to large quantities of water that inexorably freeze. Difficulty at least EE.