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The Most Beautiful Setting of any Restaurant on Earth?


Joe H

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Since I was up for the search challenge, I tried looking for the restaurant and there is nothing. A similar place would be Baita Deona. The original poster mentions bike riding trips, so it's within reason that the restaurant could be outside of Cortina proper or also a seasonable place. Also, the image's metadata is incorrect.

I would contact the original poster.

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http://blog.travelpod.com/travel-photo/kcassaro/becker_blog_07/1190330580/cortina_aug_2007_039.jpg/tpod.html

This is a photo of a restaurant deck overlooking a valley near Cortina, Italy, it is labelled "Messner's Pass" after the mountain climber. I'd like to visit it. Does anyone have an idea of the name of the restaurant?

Joe---where do you find this stuff?

The Dolomites are about the most beautiful mountains I know of, and the photo shows that pretty clearly. Been many many years for me though. I did some looking around, but have not located any actual road pass named after Messner. Based on the photo (no cars), and the fact that these folks were hikers, it seems to me this place is possibly a restaurant/snack bar on a major hiking trail, but not anywhere near a motor road. They have pretty elaborate such places over there. If I'm right, I doubt the cuisine would be of the haute variety, but quite fine as a hiker lunch spot. Certainly can't beat the view.

You're a well-known walker, so hiking out to this place might be just the thing. Certainly worth a detour, maybe one of the finest.

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Joe---where do you find this stuff?

The Dolomites are about the most beautiful mountains I know of, and the photo shows that pretty clearly. Been many many years for me though. I did some looking around, but have not located any actual road pass named after Messner. Based on the photo (no cars), and the fact that these folks were hikers, it seems to me this place is possibly a restaurant/snack bar on a major hiking trail, but not anywhere near a motor road. They have pretty elaborate such places over there. If I'm right, I doubt the cuisine would be of the haute variety, but quite fine as a hiker lunch spot. Certainly can't beat the view.

You're a well-known walker, so hiking out to this place might be just the thing. Certainly worth a detour, maybe one of the finest.

Michelin calls this "the most romantic restaurant in Italy:" http://www.hotel-laperla.it/en/for-your-pleasure/la-stüa-de-michil/4-0.html Problem is that in the area around Cortina it is seasonal and we'll be there the immediately after Easter Monday. We may be limited in what is available to us. On a plus note rates are half of only a day or two earlier.

Carol and I go to Munich, Salzburg and then on to Garmisch/Partenkirchen (most beauitful mountain community I have seen) in two weeks; next spring Cortina, Panzano and Venice in a trip that an erupting volcano cancelled last year. All of these use United miles and/or upgrades that will otherwise expire (Million Mile Flyer-me-who is retiring) and Starwood points (several hundred thousand). Incredibly, United today sets aside two seats per plane for what are called System Wide Upgrades even for flights where tickets are purchased eight months in advance. I've sold rides to Gardaland near Lake Garda before and have driven some of this area, swearing that one day I would go back without business and a little bit of time. I wrote this on Chowhound when Carol retired in '09: http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/605395 Now it's my turn.

Not that you wouldn't have an appreciation of retirement and mountains, John....

Was there any one single area or town that was particularly memorable or just the overall experience?

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Was there any one single area or town that was particularly memorable or just the overall experience?

The overall experience. Just a beautiful area. I have some (vague) memories of specific places, but this was mostly back in the late 70's when I lived nearby, and one later visit in the late 80's. I wasn't into food as much then, research resources were primitive by today's standards, and anyway we weren't seeking out the best local restaurants, just driving around. But I do recall that the classic Italian dishes they made up there were as good as or better than the same we found down in the Po valley, maybe due in part to the hybridization from the Germanic north?! Or maybe just the mountain air.

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Sierra Mar at the Post Ranch Inn in California has both stunning views and stunning food. [This could be fun - I'd love to see people post pics of beautiful restaurant settings, even though it wouldn't help Joe H in his quest.]

Totally agree, Porcupine. A really interesting thread. To this date this is my #1 contender for the most beautiful, unique restaurant I have been to anywhere: http://www.lafornacedibarbablu.it/ This is a 2000 year old Michelin starred restaurant in a literal former furnace which fired some of the stone for the Roman Coliseum (yes, THAT Roman Coliseum...), about 100 km north of Genoa. Candlelight and beamed ceilings we had to bend under to enter rooms framed with stone and floored with brick from what must have seemed like a time before oceans were crossed. Our waiter told us that in three years on staff we were the only couple he had met who spoke English.

He had never met an American before.

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Possibly This place ? by the Messner museum - although your original picture would be taken from the hilside above the main building the deck and the little glass building looks the same.

That's a match. Check out slide 32 on this page on that site:

http://www.rifugiomonterite.it/immagini/Web_Slide_Inaugurazione_2002/Inaugurazione/inaugurazione.html

The platform doesn't exist in 2002, and there's a utility pole, but the mountainsides and the trees in the near background match exactly.

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That's a match. Check out slide 32 on this page on that site:

http://www.rifugiomonterite.it/immagini/Web_Slide_Inaugurazione_2002/Inaugurazione/inaugurazione.html

The platform doesn't exist in 2002, and there's a utility pole, but the mountainsides and the trees in the near background match exactly.

That's it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you, THANK YOU!!!! We are actually planning on going to Cortina and Verona next September and will definitely stop there. I've become somewhat obsessed with the photo and have to have a picture of me standing in the middle of it!

Thank you again-much appreciated.

Joe

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I saw that photograph during my search but didn't think the two story building in front of the smaller one could be hidden by the camera angle looking down in the original photograph.

It was an interesting search, cheers!

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Joe, you have me hooked here. We're heading north from Verona in to the Austrian Alps and we may very well have to do a drive by here just for the view. Holy crap!

Pool Boy, i also responded in the Help Wanted thread. Cortina is fantastically beautiful. We will go to the above outpost/restaurant. We were in Salzburg, Munich and Garmisch/Partenkirchen in April. These are all incredible with the Bavarian Alps receiving little recognition in the U. S. just as the Dolomites also receive little. The drive from Munich through Austria into Italy is spectacular. You'll pass near innsbruck, Bolzano and Trentino. I am told that the drive from Verona to Cortina is one of the most beauitful of all.

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I haven't driven between Munich and Verona, but I've made the trip several times in both directions by rail, and it is quite beautiful. I'm reminded of a passage in Forster's Where Angels Fear to Tread, in which two of the characters are traveling by train from the Tirol to Verona and beyond:

They travelled for thirteen hours down-hill, whilst the streams broadened and the mountains shrank,

and the vegetation changed, and the people ceased being ugly and drinking beer, and began instead

to drink wine and to be beautiful. And the train which had picked them at sunrise out of a waste of

glaciers and hotels was waltzing at sunset round the walls of Verona.

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Personally, I'd be inclined to say Trattoria Dal Billy at Cinque Terra near Livorno, Italy. At the top of one of the five islands with a porch that looks out at the water over hillsides covered in olive trees. Seafood that was caught 10 minutes before being prepared. House red and white wines worth every Euro and a wait-staff who helped me with my lousy Italian and spoke English just to help the crazy Americans. Sitting on the porch, drinking the house wine and eating fresh seafood, some of the greatest pleasures in the world.

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Perhaps not the most beautiful restaurant setting on earth, but the most beautiful I have experienced is Ristorante la Punta in Bellagio. Bellagio sits at the tip of the peninsula that separates the two lower legs of Lake Como, and la Punta is at the very tippy-tip. I didn't have a camera when I was there, and I've looked on the Web for photos that do it justice, without much success until a moment ago. Now I've found a panoramic view that comes close: http://www.panoramic...Punta,_Bellagio. Click on the "fullscreen" button, and then you can turn the picture around for a 360-degree view. The area behind where the boats are pulled up and some cars are parked is the terrace of the restaurant. The food was pretty good, but it was served in an approximation of heaven.

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I've never eaten there as it seems overpriced, but the view from Nepenthe in Big Sur, CA is hard to match.

The burgers are a small price to pay for the view and the joy of wandering around during the 2 hour wait! Even ordering a small salad just adds insult to injury!

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The burgers are a small price to pay for the view and the joy of wandering around during the 2 hour wait! Even ordering a small salad just adds insult to injury!

When driving up the coast, I've never not stopped there. I've just hung around outside the little shop for awhile; have never eaten there.

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