Passo del Lucomagno
1'917 m
Graubünden / Ticino
The Lukmanier Pass climbs to 1,915 metres between Disentis in Graubünden and the Blenio Valley in Ticino, one of the lowest and most accessible of all the trans-Alpine routes.
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The Lukmanier Pass climbs to 1,915 metres between Disentis in Graubünden and the Blenio Valley in Ticino, one of the lowest and most accessible of all the trans-Alpine routes. Travelled since Roman times, it grew in importance after the founding of Disentis Abbey in 720, and during the Hohenstaufen era it was reckoned the most important north–south connection to Italy, favoured by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa on his way over the Alps, until the rise of the Gotthard eclipsed it. In 1374 the monks of Disentis built a hospice at the windswept summit to shelter travellers.
That old hospice now lies submerged beneath the Lai da Sontga Maria, the reservoir later built at the pass; a rebuilt version, with its chapel, replaced it in 1965. When the Gotthard road tunnel drew the traffic away, the Lukmanier was left to close each winter from 1980, until the volunteer association Pro Lucomagn was founded in 2005 to keep it open as long as the snows allow. The southern descent falls into the Val Blenio, the "Valley of the Sun", through alpine pasture and down into groves of chestnut, as Romansh gives way to Italian. Low, gentle and quiet, it remains one of the loveliest pass landscapes in Switzerland.
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