The Emilian Apennines
Two thousand metres an hour from the plain, beech woods, glacial lakes and villages that fill up in summer.
The ridge dividing Emilia from Tuscany is a real mountain range, even if few think of it that way: more than one summit above two thousand metres, beech woods covering entire slopes, high pasture and a quantity of small lakes left by the glaciers. Two national parks protect the best parts.
Where to go
Corno alle Scale is the mountain of the Bolognesi, with lifts and paths starting at Lizzano. Monte Cimone is the highest and can also be climbed by chairlift. Cusna dominates the Reggio country. The Hundred Lakes above Parma and Lago Santo, above Corniglio, are where you go to walk for half a day and swim in freezing water, if you are brave.
Why people come in summer
For the cool. When the plain sits at thirty-five degrees, at fifteen hundred metres it is barely twenty and at night you sleep under a blanket. The campsites are few and small, often near the lakes or the passes, and fill up only in August. Many close from October.
The access roads are narrow and winding in the last few kilometres: with a long vehicle it is worth asking before you climb, because the satnav does not tell a provincial road from a surfaced mule track.