Unusual springtime in the Dolomites
It is raining, it is spring. Soft clouds, lush green forests and meadows, pretty yellow flowers filled green carpets. Today clouds are wrapping up this wonderful natural amphitheatre, the Marmarole mountains, one of the most beautiful, wildest and least well-known mountain ranges of the Dolomites. These majestic and enchanting peaks are always there, waiting for me every day to wake up, and keep an eye on me!
What can I say, when I look out my windows, it feels like being in a painting.
I am a mountain leader, a tour guide and a tour consultant, and for me this is really an unusual spring, in a weird 2020. The pandemic has confined us at home for the last few months, cancelling all our travel possibilities, if not for real health or professional needs. Speaking of myself, I am still here “sort of stuck” at home in the Dolomites, in mid-May, deeply and daily amazed by many surprises. You might think this sounds funny, spending an entire spring at home in the mountains is something I have not been experiencing for a long time.
To me spring usually means awakening, mine too of course! It means leaving home, travelling frequently again, flying, taking a train, a boat or driving my car, chewing up the miles, obviously on foot as well, otherwise what a guide would I be! In spring I usually lead my first tours, in Italy and abroad. It is also the time of the year to discover and explore new destinations, to set up and launch new journeys and treks, and also do a little recon in the destinations for the upcoming summer and autumn tours. I am not an ordinary guide. I also take care of all bookings for hotels, restaurants, transfers, guided tours in historical centres and archeological sites, wine tastings, and organize walks, outdoor activities and other unique experiences. To say it in a few words, a wonderful and very satisfying job.
Planning and dealing with the bookings are my activities during the long winter months in the Dolomites. Sometimes I feel as a little bear that needs her winter sleep, living and working very isolated from the rest of the world in the cold season. I love winter! I am always busy anyway, as you may imagine, and rest a little without travelling allows me to look back at my busy season, and get ready, mindful and energetic, for the next one.
This year everything has changed. I might have to redo it all, or maybe reinvent it all once again; it is an unusual spring.
Time is sort of expanding unrealistically, and step by step, day by day, I feel so lucky because I can deeply enjoy and carefully observe how nature is awakening, noticing all small, big changes every single day. This is the magic I have not being able to experience so deeply and powerfully for a long time. A new sensation, experiencing the spring with its fascinating timings, I almost forgot what it was like.
It might sound a little trivial, but for me this is a real “unusual” spring. And the little bear within appreciates!
That spring I used to live absentmindedly, without dedicating enough time to it, in and out, in a few weeks or days, or in a few brief breaks between a journey and the next one, always losing something along the way, well I can now live it fully again. And I am truly capable of appreciating the rain, I have learnt to love it, because nature needs it, and so do we.
I think every situation we encounter in life can give us the courage to look forward, focusing on positive thoughts, and realise that sometimes difficulties are there to help us recover the time we lost and become aware of its importance, so that we can give it the proper true value it deserves.
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