Piz de Molinera (2288m) from Lumino

Piz de Molinera straight from the Netherlands

After driving through the night from the Netherlands (10 hours) we arrived in Val Calanca early in the morning. Our initial plan was to drive up to Alp di Stabveder and climb Pizzo di Claro like we did earlier; back in 2008. To our surpise the road starting from Arvigo was closed by a barier that wasn't here during our last visit. As a result it was not possible for us to drive up to Alp di Stabveder so we changed our plans. We drove back down to Lumino to take the Pizzo di Claro Funivia up to Monti di Savoru.

At monti di Savoru we started out hike. It was quite tough after a night of driving and without any sleep. Still, we enjoyed ourself being in the mountains again. The path leads up the mountain through the thick forest in the direction of Alpe Domas. After a nice hike we reached Alpe Domas and had our first views into the Leventina valley with Bellinzona dominating the view. At Alpe Domas we met 2 locals who were making a day trip to Capanna Broglodone. We joined them for some coffe in the Alpe Domas Hut and soon we were back on trail again.

Directly behind the hut is a wooden sign stating: Alpe di Motto. That's the trail we have to follow! This trail is not maintained anymore, but still, route finding was easy and the trail was visible at all times (T3). After speeding up our tempo it didn't take long before we reached the Rifugio Alpe di Motto. Our intital plan was to reach this hut after summitting Pizzo di Claro, but due to the closed road to Alp di Stabveder, we reached the hut from Monti di Savoru. We enjoyed the views from the hut and decided to call it a day since we were tired drom the drive from Holland. In the evening the views were fantastic in the direction of Bellinzona. The hut provides all basis supplies and offers a fenomal view towards Bellinzona.

The next morning we changed our plans and decided to head to Piz de Molinera instead of Pizzo di Claro. We climbed "the Pizzo" already several times and were never on Piz de Molinera. After reaching Alpe di Gagern, which is in case also a small Refuge with 3 beds, we had to find the trail above us connecting the Passo de Mem with Capanna Brogoldone. After some pathlass, but easy terrain we found the red-white-red marked trail and headed towards the south. At the junction, we followed the trail up to Piz de Molinera. After a nice hike over easy tterrain (T3 at max) we reached the summit of Piz de Molinera. The weather was incredible and so were the views.

Soon we decided to leave again. We descended along the path we came up and at the junction we descended down to Capanna Brogoldone. From the capanna we took the short and steep route back to Monti di Savoru were we took the Funivia back down to Lumino. From Lumino we drove to Campeggio Al Censo in Claro. I hiked this route together with Bart and Ron. It was a fun time out in the mountains, Ticino is great.

Also see: http://www.summitpost.org/users/lodewijk/26969
and: http://www.summitpost.org/ticino-tessin/354935