For foodies
Where to eat well in Aosta Valley
8 towns
Towns holding at least one place a guide put its name to. The ones several guides agree on come first.
Courmayeur
Province: Aosta Valley · 1,224 m
The Italian base of the 4,810-meter peak, a Roman waystation on the Via delle Gallie that became the country's highest commune and its best-known ski address.
Cogne
Province: Aosta Valley · 1,534 m
The mining town turned capital of the Gran Paradiso, the Aosta Valley's largest commune with 95 percent of its land inside Italy's oldest park.
Valtournenche
Province: Aosta Valley · 1,524 m
The valley under the Cervino, home of the guides who raced Whymper up the mountain in 1865.
Ayas
Province: Aosta Valley · 1,710 m
A scattered upper-valley commune of three villages, where Walser settlers and Romance-speaking herders share the slopes below Castor and Pollux.
Bard
Province: Aosta Valley · 400 m
A 108-person village under the largest Savoy fortress in the Alps.
Fénis
Province: Aosta Valley · 537 m
The Castello di Fénis, with its double ring of crenellated walls, eight cylindrical towers, and frescoed inner courtyard, sits at the centre of a small Aostan commune east of Aosta, with an Apennine reserve climbing south to 3,000m.
La Thuile
Province: Aosta Valley · 1,441 m
Italy's gateway to the Petit Saint-Bernard pass: a 1,441m alpine village under Mont Blanc, with the Rutor glacier and its tiered waterfalls behind it and a Roman-Salassi history that goes back two millennia.
Saint-Vincent
Province: Aosta Valley · 575 m
A belle-époque thermal town on a sunny south-facing terrace at 575m, where a mineral spring, a landmark casino, and a Matterhorn view north of town define a resort built for the 19th-century cure.
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From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Cicala
Province: Catanzaro
A village of 887 people at 829 meters, founded in 1616 by farmers asking for land.
Fossombrone
Province: Pesaro e Urbino
An inland Marchigiano town on the Metauro river, layered over a Roman colony with a Renaissance ducal court rising above it.
Bagnoli del Trigno
Province: Isernia
The 'Pearl of Molise', a 637-resident borgo built into and around a massive limestone outcrop above the Trigno valley, with a medieval castle rebuilt on its summit.
Varenna
Province: Lecco
A fishing village founded in 769 on the Lecco arm of Lake Como, with a steep grid of streets falling into the water.
Rocca di Botte
Province: L'Aquila
At 750 meters on the Carseolani slopes between Abruzzo and Lazio, the birthplace of an eleventh-century hermit and a fief of the Colonna.