Day 3 – Hiking Around The Plose Summit

Oct 10, 2022

Today’s Adventure

Today’s adventure started out with a short bus ride from Brixen to Sant’Andrea. From there we boarded a cable car for a long ride up to the summit of the Plose, a large massif that dominates the skyline to the east of Brixen. The Plose is a popular ski area in the winter and a mecca for mountain biking in the summer. We knew that the cable car was going to be shutting down in just a few days for the shoulder season in between those two extremes, so we had to plan for this outing early in our visit.

After a quick pit stop at the upper station for the cable car we picked up Trail 17, which is also known as the Woody Walk due to the numerous large scale wood carvings located along the way. This trail follows the flanks of the three peaks that make up the resort so it was a good way to take an informal tour of the ski terrain.

We then linked together several short segments on other trails to take us past the Rifugio Schatzer to an intersection with Trail 4. We didn’t know until we noticed the signage that this particular trail is part of the Alta Via 2, which is roughly akin to being an Italian version of the Appalachian Trail. We wandered down through the woods to the valley below where we found two rifugios, both of them open for lunch.

We had originally planned to eat at the Edelweißhütte, but instead we more or less randomly chose the small, family-run Gasthaus Halslhütte (Rifugio Halsl Hütte) right next door. Cindy ordered their traditional Tyrolean dumplings on white slaw which looked quite tasty. I ordered their Wiener Schnitzel, something that I have quite often when traveling in Europe because it’s generally safe for my food allergies. As a result I know this dish quite well and think that this was some of the best that I’ve had.

After finishing lunch we headed back up the trail towards the Parkhotel Residence. We had hoped to catch the bus there, but the signs that we found at the bus stop indicated that it was unexpectedly not running in the off season. We continued along the trail to the base of the Sessellift Palmschoß (a chairlift for the ski resort) where we were able to catch a bus that was still in service.

This bus took us all the way back to the Bahnhof in Brixen. The ride included a stop at the base of the Plose cable car where the bus filled up with people coming off the mountain at the end of the day. We were very glad that we had boarded back at the origin of this particular route instead of extending that leg of our hike all the way back to the cable car, and then having to fight for a seat on the bus. It was a happy accident, but reminded is that this is a good strategy if we expect a bus (or train) to be crowded.

Once back in Brixen we took our usual stroll back from the Bahnhof to our apartment. We did make a quick stop, as usual, at our neighbor Despar grocery to pick up a few items for upcoming meals before settling in for a quiet evening.

To return to the main page for Brixen click here.

To return to the main page for the entire trip click here.