Val Gardena, South Tyrol, Italy
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Val Gardena, South Tyrol, Italy
Val Gardena, or Gherdeïna in the Ladin language, is a wonderful valley in South Tyrol - Alto Adige in North Italy.
Val Gardena is the heart of italian Dolomites and the group of mountains enclosing the valley includes the famous massifs of Sella, Sassolungo, Cir and Odle. The three main towns of Val Gardena are Santa Cristina di Val Gardena, Selva Gardena and Ortisei.
Val Gardena offers to tourists a wide range of activities and services: during winter season tourists can go skiing or snowboarding, make cross country skiing along over 1,000 km of skiing slopes, make excursions in snowshoes, ice climbing, sledge trips enjoying the wonderful and unique landscape of Val Gardena: Dolomites peaks, snow covered woods, glaciers, alpine huts, places covered with virgin snow, beautiful sunsets and other gorgeous settings.
During spring, summer and autumn Val Gardena offers a great variety of outdoor activities: mountain climbing, trekking, excursions, horse riding, mountain bike trips, nordic walking, nature walks for animal watching and typical food tasting and so on.
Val Gardena offers not only beautiful landscapes, but also art and culture. In Val Gardena tradition is still alive, in fact the most population speaks the original language, Ladin, that is still taught at school and there are books and newspapers written in this language, a Ladin radio station and television news in Ladin language.
Also woodcarving tradition, started in Val Gardena in XVII century, is still alive. First wood sculptors began producing utensils for daily use but from XVIII century they produced also religious wood sculptures and figurines of animals and secular characters and wood handicraft become the most important economic activity in the valley.
Nowadays wood carvings, wood sculptures, wood statues, wood figurines made in Val Gardena are famous all over the world for their high quality and great artistic value. In Val Gardena there are also some wood art schools where studied the most famous wood artists of the valley.
The masterpieces of the talented master wood artisans of Val Gardena can be admired in the Val Gardena Museum or during the Sculptors Fair (Unika) where all the wood sculptures are entirely hand carved. Master artisans realized in the Holy Year 2000 the largest wooden crib in the world, entirely hand carved, in permanent exhibition in the Iman Centre of Santa Cristina di Val Gardena.
Typical of Val Gardena's traditions are also traditional costumes. Once any costume represented a social status and people wore traditional costumes during weddings. Nowadays traditional costumes are worn in religious processions and folkloristic festivities.
Val Gardena has been selected as european member of "Leading Mountain Resorts of the World", an international network of resorts, representing the best mountain holiday experiences available year-round.
Val Gardena, Italy, valley full of history and tradition, with its beautiful landscape, majestic mountains, evergreen forests, alpine lakes, is the ideal place for a relaxing holiday.
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