Starting from Canazei or Arabba, the Passo Pordoi meanders upwards, topping out at 2239m. It is the second-highest pass in the Dolomites after the Passo Sella.
Like all the other passes of the Dolomites, the Passo Pordoi has been fiercely contested during countess, pointless wars. Often, more people died from the freezing conditions than enemy action. On the eastern slopes of the Pordoi, the Austria-Hungarian/German war memorial looks across to the Marmolada Glacier, where Austrian soldiers built quarters in glacier tunnels, forming an "ice city."
Today, the morning mist slowly disperses across the Passo Pordoi and the road to Arabba. The switchbacks here reach epidemic proportions with one of the highest concentrations of hairpins anywhere in these mountains. Do road engineers charge extra for hairpins? Thirty-three in less than ten kilometres, that's 3.5 turns per kilometre.
I think they might.
