Centovalli

The Centovalli, the valley of a hundred valleys, links Locarno with the Italian Domodossola. Through the wild gorge landscape runs the Centovalli Railway, a narrow-gauge line over numerous bridges and through tunnels, past chestnut forests and waterfalls, especially impressive in autumn.

Highlights

• Centovalli Railway over bridges and through tunnels
• Wild gorges and chestnut forests
• Cross-border to Domodossola
• Autumn colours especially beautiful

Good to know

Practical info

Background & History

The Centovalli, the “hundred valleys”, are a wildly romantic gorge in Ticino through which the river Melezza carves its way from Locarno to the Italian border. The region owes its vivid name to the countless side valleys and steep ravines that fall away from the slopes into the main gorge and strongly fragment the terrain. For centuries the people in the scattered mountain villages lived in great poverty from meagre arable farming, from chestnut forests and from livestock farming, which is why many of them had to seek their fortune as emigrants in distant lands and in some cases returned only late.

An old tradition of the region is the working of lavez, a soft soapstone from which the inhabitants made heat-resistant pots, stoves and crockery, a craft deeply rooted in the history of the valley and reaching back into prehistoric times. The Centovalli became famous above all through the Centovalli Railway, opened in 1923, which runs on a narrow gauge from Locarno across to Domodossola in Italy. On its journey it crosses bold viaducts and passes through deep gorges, past chestnut groves, hamlets and waterfalls. This railway made the once secluded valley accessible and today ranks among the finest mountain routes of the Alps.