By MARK ELLWOOD
Last updated: 6:52 am
January 6, 2009
Posted: 1:17 am
January 6, 2009
IT was the fur coats that did it.
Walking through Cortina d'Ampezzo on a winter's day, there were as many full-length minks as CP Company puffy coats - yes, even sometimes on the men. Nowhere but in Italy has PETA's pleading gone so utterly unheeded.
PHOTOS: SKIING IN CORTINA, ITALY
Such a glut of pelts underscored the retro glamour for which this town's renowned, a "Dolce Vita"-era mystique propped up equally by the designer boutiques - Gucci, Malo, Bulgari - dotted along the main drag and the fact that, even in high season, there's still not a store that stays open during siesta time.
Squirreled away high in the Dolomites, north of Venice, Cortina d'Ampezzo a Bond-esque (Connery era) picture postcard of folksy chalets and winding streets, punctuated with groovy, mod additions, nods to its fifteen minutes of fame, aka when the winter Olympics descended in 1956.
The only other evidence: a superb winter-sports infrastructure that's been maintained since the athletes decamped all those years ago. There's a reason Cortina snagged the Olympics - the slopes here, spread across an eastern and western mountain range, are some of Italy's best.
It's surprising, then, that prices are more Jersey Shore than St. Moritz. In season, three-star hotels hover around $100 while an espresso on the terrace of the storied De La Poste hotel is around $2 (stunning valley views are free). Even the aprés-ski isn't over the top: The early evening hub is Da Gerry on the Via del Mercato, a cramped enoteca full of regulars who greet one another in rapid-fire Italian. Their chatter bubbles noisily over the clatter of fresh-washed plates and clink of just-cleaned glasses.
The wine menu's scrawled on the mirror behind the bar: A glass of local prosecco is around $4, and most other wines no more than $5.50; tramezzini, sandwich-like morsels, cost only $2.35.
The priciest things in the place? Those fur coats, of course, laid artfully over the rickety stools.
LOWDOWN
GO: Fly into the gleaming Venice Marco Polo airport, rent a car from one of the in-terminal desks then take the 2-3 hour drive (depending on your nerves on those hairpin mountain roads) up to Cortina d'Ampezzo.
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