Pieve, Italy

It was time to head north to the mountains. We chose to take the scenic route along Lake Garda. It was spectacular with the mountains on one side, and the water on the other. Then, on a whim, Keith found this little village at the top of one of the mountains. I was driving and he said “Let's go check this out”, so up we went. We thought the hill climb at Vareena was steep, this one made that look like nothin’. It took us 30 minutes to reach the “top" - at least that was when we decided to stop.

Tremosine Sul Garda is a mountain top community with 18 hamlets (small towns). Most of them were farms and it was exhausting to think how much work they had to do to farm land on a hill. Many fields were stair-stepped up the hill, and some were flat.

The hamlets were small, but had a mercato (grocery store) a few restaurants, and occassionally a church. Elevation of Lake Garda is 216 feet, but in this little hamlet, it is 1358 feet. Those mountains are closer than they appear.

Half way up the mountain, we found this decorated Christmas tree. Maybe they don't know it's June way up there.

When we arrived at the top, is was mid afternoon and we found the town to be pretty quiet. The lunch hour was over, but we found this very nice restaurant, with a view of the water. It turned out to be the best restaurant in town and we had a delicious lunch! We also got to enjoy a family celebrating their parents 50th wedding anniversary. It was quite a treat.

We tried to find a shop where we could get some postcards but they were all closed. So we fueled up, checked the brakes and headed back down the mountain.