Alpe di Neggia
1'394 m
Ticino / Lombardia, Italy
The Passo della Neggia – the Alpe di Neggia – is a modest balcony pass at 1,395 metres, set in the saddle between Monte Gambarogno and Monte Tamaro, high above the eastern shore of Lake Maggiore in Ticino.
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DESCRIPTION
The Passo della Neggia – the Alpe di Neggia – is a modest balcony pass at 1,395 metres, set in the saddle between Monte Gambarogno and Monte Tamaro, high above the eastern shore of Lake Maggiore in Ticino. It is no ancient trade route, but a glorious climb: from Vira on the lakeshore the road climbs rapidly through steep, narrow hairpins, the views of the lake simply superb, looking out over the bays of Locarno and Ascona. The gradient is unrelenting – the final ramps run at 8 to 10% and pitch as steeply as 12% – so that cyclists reckon the ascent worthy of a major Alpine pass, the Vira flank alone stacking 33 hairpins above the lake. From the pass a footpath climbs to Monte Gambarogno, whose summit opens a panorama reaching from the lake to the Monte Rosa massif.
On its far side the road drops to Indemini, a tiny village pressed hard against the Italian border that seems lost in time – the only traditional Ticino village built completely from locally quarried stone, its houses standing close together under stone roofs, a haven of tranquillity linked to the rest of the Gambarogno by road only in 1917. On the way down, the lonely oratory of Sant'Anna still shelters precious frescoes from the 14th and 15th centuries. A small, quiet, lovely crossing – a balcony over one of the most beautiful lakes in the Alps, and a doorway into a forgotten corner of Ticino.
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