Col Margherita

“Simple dishes, conceived and cooked responsibly with respect for seasonality. An honest cuisine that draws on the experiences of mountain life”. This, in a nutshell, is the philosophy that chef Alfio Ghezzi expresses at InAlto, the refuge that lies 2,514m above Col Margherita, in the Ski Area San Pellegrino. Situated at the start of one of the most adrenalin-packed black runs of the Dolomiti Superski, La VolatA, InAlto provides a thoughtful, all-day offering, from morning to evening, according to everyone’s needs, for breakfast, for a lunch break, an aperitif or a tasty snack on snow days, but also in the height of summer. Patron of the Senso restaurant, which boasts a Michelin star, Ghezzi has chosen a place where he can combine his passion for cooking with his love of high altitude. The menu focuses on simple dishes conceived and cooked by the young resident chef Gianluca Pittigher.

The Col Margherita- the starting point of La VolatA – is a place where you can cycle while breathing air as pure as the Arctic Circle’s. This is according to data from the CNR station located at the summit, at 2,520 metres. Here, in one of the most charming balconies in the Alps, ozone values slightly lower than those of Ny-Ålesund (Svalbard Islands, Norway), the world’s northernmost inhabited town, are measured by the instruments of the Zeppelin station. Above Falcade and the San Pellegrino Pass, the air is as clean as in Ny-Ålesund, where the CNR’s Dirigibile Italia base is located. Two places with a panorama that is unrivalled in the world, one overlooking the Greenland Sea, the other some of the most impressive Dolomite peaks, from the south face of the Marmolada to the Pale di San Martino. Midnight sun, aurora borealis, perennial glaciers and enchanting fjords in the northern location, peaks, rock faces and sunlit paths in the Col Margherita. The northernmost inhabited lands on planet Earth, in the Svalbard archipelago, record ozone values of 100 µg m-3 while on the Col Margherita the maximum 8-hour value is 99.8 µg m-3.

PM10 levels are also similar: the summer levels on the Col Margherita (6±2 µg m-3) can be compared to those in Svalbard, (between 1-15 µg m-3) as well as at the Jungfraujoch station in the western Swiss Alps (at 3,580 m above sea level the levels recorded are 6±3 μg m-3)and Norway (in July and August 5-7 µg m-3)(in July and August 5-7 µg m) (in July and August 5±3 µg m-3) ). l.m the recorded levels are 6±3 μg m-3) and in Norway (in July and August 5-7 μg m-3).