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Stemma di Ayas

Aosta Valley · Aosta Valley

Ayas

A scattered upper-valley commune of three villages, where Walser settlers and Romance-speaking herders share the slopes below Castor and Pollux.

Best time
Jun–Sep, Dec–Mar
By car
1 h 38 min from Turin
Population
1,357

Known for

  • MONTE ROSA

    The 4,000-meter peaks of Castor, Pollux and the Breithorn close the valley head, fed by the Verra glacier.

  • MONTEROSA SKI

    Champoluc is one of the three main valleys of the lift-linked domain, sharing 180 kilometers of pistes with Gressoney and Alagna.

  • WALSER ROOTS

    Saint-Jacques-des-Allemands carries the name of the thirteenth-century German-speaking settlers who crossed the Theodul Pass from Valais.

When to visit

Best · Jun–Sep, Dec–Mar

  • J1°
  • F3°
  • M3°
  • A6°
  • M12°
  • J17°
  • J20°
  • A20°
  • S15°
  • O11°
  • N5°
  • D1°
  • Best
  • Hot or crowded
  • Quiet
  • Mostly closed

Daytime averages, 2020–2024. Weather data by Open-Meteo.com.

The festa: Martino di Tours, 11 November

Why come

Ayas runs along the upper Évançon valley, its municipal seat at Antagnod (1,710 meters) and its main resort centers at Champoluc (1,568 meters) and the hamlet at the valley head. The 1,357 residents are spread across these three villages and dozens of smaller hamlets. Antagnod is the older village, its parish church holding the seventeenth-century altar that makes it the religious seat of the commune.

Champoluc sits lower, on a flat stretch of the upper valley, and functions as the working entry point to the lift domain, with gondola and cable car reaching across two cols into Piedmont. The hamlet at the valley head keeps the medieval name of the German-speaking settlers who farmed these slopes after crossing from Valais in the thirteenth century, while the valley itself is watered by glacial melt from above. The commune, in short, is a set of villages at different altitudes doing different jobs: worship in one, skiing in another, memory of settlement in a third, all fed by the same glacier and the same river.

The Sunday letter

Ayas is on our list. Its letter is still to come.

We are writing about all 1,000 of these towns, one at a time, in a free letter every Sunday: the photo, the food, the festa. That is our mission. Sign up and you will be there when Ayas comes up. By Peter & Sophia, from Turin.

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Read on

Ayas in our articles

How to get there

From Turin (TRN), about 1h 35m by car.

Milan (BGY) is about 2h 50m away.

By car from the centre of Genoa 3 hours.

Every town within reach of Turin airport.

Ayas, photo 1
Ayas, photo 2

What to see

  • Chiesa di San Martino

    Parish church in Antagnod with a seventeenth-century polyptych altar, the religious seat of the commune.

  • Monterosa Ski

    Lift-linked domain reaching 3,250 meters, crossing two cols to link the valley with Gressoney-La-Trinité and Alagna Valsesia.

  • Castore e Polluce

    The 4,226-meter Castor and 4,091-meter Pollux, twin peaks of the Monte Rosa massif on the Italy-Switzerland border above the valley head.

  • Champoluc

    Main resort village at 1,568 meters in a flat section of the upper valley, with the principal lift station of the ski domain.

  • Saint-Jacques-des-Allemands

    Hamlet at the valley head whose medieval suffix records the thirteenth-century Walser settlement of these slopes.

  • Ghiacciaio del Verra

    Glacier descending from the Breithorn and Castor, principal source of the Évançon torrent that drains the valley.

The slow-trip planner

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We recommend

Where to eat

Not our picks, but places the guides put their name to: a Michelin star, a Gambero Rosso fork, a Slow Food snail, a Michelin Key for the hotels. Worth a table, a counter, or a night when you pass through.

Living here

  • Population 1,357, down 4.6% since 2015
  • Remotei
  • Pharmacy in town
  • Nearest public hospital Aosta, 35 km as the crow flies
  • Full fibre reaches 75% of homes
  • Primary school in the comune
  • Earthquake zone 3, low hazard
  • Nearest airport Turin, 1 h 35 min drive
  • Regional capital Aosta, 1 h 3 min drive

Could you live here?

Ayas is at the end of the road.

  • A village of 1,357. The nearest town of 5,000 people, Aosta, is 1 h 12 min away: past our 15-minute rule, which makes this the end of the road.
  • Aosta, a city of 33,093, is 1 h 12 min by car. Further than our 30 to 60 minutes, a long way for the hospital visit or the monthly shopping.

The rules come from our series Where to Move in Italy, written from the places we have lived: Part 1, The End of the Road · Part 2, The Small Town · Part 3, The City. The rest of the series, and the best towns to move to, arrive in the Sunday letter.

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Common questions

What is Ayas known for?
Ayas is a scattered upper-valley commune of three villages, where Walser settlers and Romance-speaking herders share the slopes below Castor and Pollux.
Where is Ayas?
Ayas is a comune in the province of Aosta Valley, in Aosta Valley, at 1710 meters above sea level.
What is the nearest airport to Ayas?
Turin (TRN), about 1h 35m by car.
How long is the drive from Genoa to Ayas?
About 3 hours by car.
When is the best time to visit Ayas?
Best in Jun–Sep, Dec–Mar. August is the warmest month, averaging 20 degrees, and June the wettest, with about 19 rain days.
Is there a sagra or a festival in Ayas?
The town keeps its patron saint's day: Martino di Tours, 11 November.
Which other towns are like Ayas?
Cogne, Valtournenche and Canazei.
How many people live in Ayas?
1,357 at the 2023 count.
Is Ayas a good place to live?
By the rules in our Where to Move in Italy series, Ayas is at the end of the road: the nearest town of 5,000 people, Aosta, is 1 h 12 min away. The nearest city, Aosta, is 1 h 12 min away by car. The nearest public hospital is in Aosta, 35 km as the crow flies. Full fibre reaches 75% of homes.
Tags & datadesignations · numbers · sources

Recognised as

The numbers

  • Elevation: 1710 m
  • Population: 1,357
  • Surface area: 129.42 km²

These figures were compiled from public directories: ISTAT, OpenStreetMap and Wikidata, and from the official listings of the guides named on this page. Town details change; verify with official sources before you travel.

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