After haemorrhaging a bit more cash that we planned in Switzerland over the previous week, we decided to head to Livigno, Italy. We love skiing Italy for many reasons with the added bonus that it is a lot cheaper for everything.

The Wiki bit…

Livigno enjoys a special tax status as a duty-free area. Italian VAT is not paid. Although tax advantages for Livigno were recorded as far back as the sixteenth century, the current tax exemption was first introduced by the Austrian Empire around 1840. It was then confirmed by the Kingdom of Italy around 1910, then by the Italian Republic and the European Economic Community in 1960. Although no VAT is paid, income taxes are, thus Livigno cannot be considered as a tax haven.

The justification for such a status is the difficulty in reaching Livigno during winter, and the centuries-long history of poverty in the region. The various states wanted to ensure people would have an incentive to live in the area (so that they could claim it territorially). At the same time, the tax revenue from Livigno would have been negligible.

We finalised our pink and blue jobs before attempting to leave the campsite at Rinerhorn. Maggie had frozen to the ground due to the on/off freeze/thaw weather we had experienced while we were here. It took several attempts and different ideas for around 45 minutes to free Magster from the camping ground’s ice grip on her tyres. Had she made friends while we were night skiing and didn’t want to leave? There were some good looking  eligible motorhomes suspiciously close to our location, and she seemed very reluctant to leave.

Anyway, the winning combo to get us out of this pickle was snow socks, snow chains, a shovel and plenty of grit provided by a nice German couple who had arrived that morning and park next to us.

The journey to Livigno from Davos is around 75km and in involved a car train and a toll tunnel. While on the car train we decided to take luncheon, this was quite unsuccessful and rushed as we didn’t know how long the passage would take. (we’re enjoying the Downton Abbey box set as we pen this blog, hmm quite).

As the train gathered speed we could hear crashes of ice being blown off the roof, each crash behind us was met with us both pulling a silly face and looking at each other, you know, the one you pull when something bad happens that you can’t control, like dropping a bowl.

 

We alighted the other end and immediately noticed a the car that was parked behind us on the train flashing its headlights and signally us to pull over. Expecting the worst, we reluctantly pulled over thinking we would to be confronted with an irate car owner, we were surprised to see a friendly old couple who made no issue of the ice smashing into their newly purchased car, they just wanted to see if there was any damage with us present, and blamed the weather conditions for the ice and that we couldn’t be expected to clear it from the roof before driving.

After confirming there was no damage to their car we drove on, with the couple still driving behind us. A few kilometres down the road we made a left turn and the couple beeped their horn and waved us on our way as they continued straight.

On arriving at the Livigno customs control there was a green light to enter the tunnel, but unsure of the system, Mark decided to pull over and check with the custom officials. We were told to just drive on, by which time the light had turned red.

After 15 minutes waiting it was green to go, with the queue stacked up behind us, Maggie’s wheels refused to take sufficient grip to get us up the ice gradient and into the tunnel. With hazard lights engaged, the long queue of traffic behind us piled into the tunnel. With the traffic behind us clear, we rolled Maggie backwards down the hill with all custom officials watching, and took an ambitious ‘run-up’. Some high revs and sideways slipping later, the tyres took grip on the snow free tarmac and we juddered into the tunnel.

We arrived at the campsite at 4pm and Jess wrote in her diary while Mark faffed with the Wifi, followed by the skis in the garage – he does love a faff!

Later that evening we walked into town for a few drinks and dinner at a small pizzeria at the edge of town. On the way home Mark decided to play a game of ‘snow dunk’ which involves pushing the opponent continuously into the snow each time they regain balance. When we arrived back at Maggie the door keys that were missing and we had to retrace our steps to find them. Luckily they were found at a snow dunk location Jess had imprinted on the way home!

The next morning the skies were clear so while Mark left for first lifts, Jess hung back and got stuck into finishing the end of ‘Little Girl Gone’, a book she had been reading before picking up and consequently getting hooked on ‘Into Thin Air’ (Mark’s book). On the hill it was empty and it felt almost criminal carving up the obsessively pisted runs across the north facing mountains. Mark went on to make lunch friends with a flock of birds that managed to con a bowl of croutons that were destined for his soup as he sat there feeding them like a scene out of Mary Poppins. Mark returned back to Maggie early afternoon and we decided, due to the reduced cost in the area, to take the backcountry skis into town to have the bindings moved. After a hike around the town we were unable to find a ski shop that were able to perform this due to the width of the skis.

That night we pushed the boat out and dined in a locally recommended restaurant, Paprika. An amazing three course meal with champagne and a few after-dinner Disaronnos came to 150 Euro, result! We made our way home and while en route a second round of ‘snow dunk’ was called, but this time all keys were stowed before the game commenced.

When we arrived home we continued the competition with a game of frustration, with the loser having to perform a forfeit. Mark lost and was charged with performing a lap of Maggie barefoot in his pants. On Mark’s bundled return through the door, he trapped his thumb resulting in a nasty (almost to the bone, in his words) cut. It was obviously cold outside too! We took this as a sign to go to bed and sleep it off.

Hungover. We managed to crawl down the ladder by late morning to make a revolting brunch of ‘Porc Cassoulet’ and bread, not sure what we were thinking, but we just about stomached the bread. We ended up climbing back up the ladder into bed to finish watching Antman which we had started a few days prior. Mark had a little ‘Nana Nap’ before we decided it would be best to get some fresh air and take a walk into town for some supplies from the local shop. After filling both our backpacks with carbs and comforting snacks, our hangovers had worsened and we decided the best cure would be to grab a takeaway pizza to eat in the comfort of Maggie. Actually, we picked up one pizza each and a calzone to share for a starter! Needless to say, we didn’t finish it all and most of the pizzas ended up at the bottom of the fridge. At the end of our incredibly lazy day we somehow managed to stream The Lovely Bones on the campsite wifi before we both drifted off into unsurprisingly disturbed sleeps.

We skied the afternoon the next day after grabbing a quick sushi lunch in town. The Livigno skiing area is spit into two parts which now includes dedicated freeride off-piste, which was previously banned for several years. Both sides of the valley now have great balance and spit of long wide pistes vs off-piste terrain which we explored, making our way through the trees and back to the doorstep of the campsite.

After four nights at Camping Permont (80 Euro, including electric and all the facilities) we decided to move back to Austria in the run-up to meeting Jess’ parents in Mayhofen, but not before stocking up on duty free booze and thrashing around on rental skidoos…

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