Val Vogna

Val Vogna
opening of Val Vogna with Corno Rosso (m. 2979) in the background
Val Vogna
Floor elevation	1100
Long-axis direction	east-west
Geography
Population centers	Riva Valdobbia
Rivers	Vogna

Val Vogna Val Vogna (I' Vejin in Walser) is a lateral valley of Valsesia, inside the municipality of Riva Valdobbia.

West of Riva Valdobbia town, opens the Val Vogna, a side valley just in part served by paved road, on the old so-called Antica via d'Aosta “ancient Aosta Track”, that united Riva Valdobbia with Gressoney-Saint-Jean throught the colle di Valdobbia, the Valdobbia Pass.

On the pass, the rifugio Ospizio Sottile was built in the XIX century to give shelter to the people moving in and out the valley. The “Aosta Track” was a major emigration route for most of the Sesia Valley people going for seasonal works abroad, mostly in France. The Sesia Valley goes basically eastward from the Monte Rosa to Varallo and the plains, so it was much shorter to pass the mountains in this relative safe spot.

As the migrations period were early in spring and late in the autumn, accidents due to bad weather and avalanches were frequent. A small provisonary hut was built, then the more substanzial Ospizio in stone was built and dedicated to the canonic Nicolao Sottile, a priest that worked hard to find the money and volunteers for the building. The bell on the front would ring to help people in need to find the Ospizio in foggy or dark days. Today, the Ospizio Sottile is a common travelling point for hikers and mountaneers.

Geography

Roads

Val Vogna opens west of Riva Valdobbia, with Val d'Otro north and Valle Artogna south.
The valley has a paved road that started near Riva Valdobbia's cemetery and goes up with few //tornante// to the frazione (hamlet) Cà di Janzo and then gently uphill to Sant'Antonio Hamlet.

Private vehicles must stop in the parking lot behind Sant'Antonio school house (now a restaurant and mountain hut): a dirt road goes up to just under La Peccia hamlet, but its use on offroad vehicles is restricted to farmers and local inhibitants.

Paths and hikes

Val Vogna was an emigration ruote, connecting Valsesia and Val d'Aosta throught the colle Valdobbia pass (2480 m.).

The Antica via d'Aosta, latter renamed via Regia (Royal path), follows the Vogna Valley on the same path of the actual paved/dirt road, with few deviations, up to La Peccia and the Napoleonic bridge: here, the track left the main valley and climbed on the west bulkhead of the Rissuolo torrent valley, up to La Montata Hamlet (m. 1739) and then inside up to Colle Valdobbia and its Ospizio Sottile mountain hut.

This track is identified as No.201 by Club Alpino Italiano, with a black 1 on a red/yellow/red triparted marking on stones and trees.

The track 1a variant leaves the main one after La Montata and head west on the woods on a short track to the Alpe Larecchio a former mountain lake basin, now a pasture land of marshes and grassfields, where a small nucleus of few houses is still in use to make Toma cheese.

Track 1c gets a different ruote, from Alpe Larecchio to the west, up to Lago della Balma lake and then east on the peaks to reach the Colle Valdobbia

De_Saussure followed the entire valley on his Great Tour of the Alpes: the GTA (or no.205 patch) continued gently uphill from the Napoleonic Bridge following Vogna Torrent up to Alpe Maccagno another ancient pasture land at 2188m. with few ruined stone houses: this was the place of the original Toma del Maccagno cheese, while nowadays the name is in use by many producers, mostly on the Biella area that lay behind Passo del Maccagno Pass.

The CAI No.202 track (bold 2 on red/yellow/red) that leaves the dirt road midway between Sant'Antonio and La Peccia Hamlet to head up the east bank of the Rissuolo valley to Alpe Pile where the Rifugio Abate Carestia mountain hut is locaded and then up to Lago Bianco and Lago Nero (White and Black Lake) or the Corno Bianco, 3320 m., the highest peak in the vogna valley.

No.211 track gets to Corno Bianco in a more direct way, while No.210 starts from the lower hamlet of Ca di' Janzo, on the paved road, and climbs directly to Selveglio Hamlet and then the Cima Mutta peak 2135, the north bulkhead of the Vogna Valley overlooking Riva Valdobbia.

The frazioni Alte or Via della Fede ring

The above mentioned tracks were mostly for experienced or dedicated hikers. A less strenuous but more intetesting walk is the so called giro delle Frazioni Alte, the Higher Hamlets ring. This ring is also marked as Via della Fede (Faith path) by a separate organization, making some confusion in signs and names.

Basically, the tour touched all the Hamlets of the lower Vogna valley, in an in-depth exploration of how Walser lived up to XIX century.

Each Hamlet is a self-sufficent nucleus, with a fountain, a community owen and a small chapel: but they are few hundred meters away one from the others creating a larger sparse community.

The ring has somehow an fixed route: it's basically a triangle, with the lower road (the above mentioned No.1 track) from Ca' di Janzoand the higher path from Selveglio converging on La Peccia. The steep slope between the two paths doesn't allow to easily connect the lower and the higher Hamlets, except for the Sant'Antonio-Rabernardo shortcut.

So the usual way is to leave the car at Ca di Janzo and climb into the no.10 track heading to Selveglio/Cima Mutta. Reached the Selveglio Hamlet, follow the track going west (left): without much change in altitude, that plain track will lead to Oro, Ca' Vescovo, Rabernardo, Cambiaveto, Piane and finally La Peccia hamlets. Then, going downhill on the dirt road, the ring will touch the lower hamlets of Sant'Antonio, Ca'Verno, Ca'Morca, Ca' Piacentino and back to Ca' di Janzo

External links

• www.example.com