Recommended accommodation
 |
**** Hotel Girlanerhof, Girlan |
 |
Eppan and its many castles...
Eppan in South Tyrol is the collective name for several villages in the northern part of the Ueberetsch. The most important of them being St. Pauls und St. Michael which are imbedded in countless vineyards, cedars, cypresses and pine trees.
The mild climate in Eppan sees to an excellent grape harvest which is the prerequisite for producing the renowned first-class wine. During a holiday in Eppan you will have many an opportunity to try one or the other. Leaving St. Michael in the direction of the romantic Gleif Chapel, you can wander to the ‘ice holes’. Even throughout summer, Porphyry rocks still disseminate cold air, despite outside temperatures of 35 degrees Celsius and consequently the ice never melts. In the immediate abouts you will find that there is high mountain vegetation, despite the fact that the place at 600 metres above sea level is actually rather low for such a flora. This exciting phenomenon is not only a welcome and cooling refreshment to the plants, but also for by-passers who want to get some rest after an extensive hike.
...and some lakes, too!
If you want to get full body refreshment, then you may want to go to the Montiggler Lakes that are romantically imbedded in the forest and hence hardly visible from outside. Back to St. Pauls, you can pay the ‘Dome in the country’ a visit. The tower of the parish church is 89 metres tall and can be seen from almost anywhere in Ueberetsch. Not only the parish church is well worth a stopover, but also the numerous estates and castles. With 40 fortresses and 160 historic estates, Eppan certainly constitutes one of the culturally richest regions in the whole of South Tyrol. Needless to say it is an absolute must to go and see at least some of them when you get here. You can easily combine a wonderful walk to one or even all of them. An absolute highlight however is Castle Sigmundskron/Firmian which the famous climber Reinhold Messner had turned into a museum of mountaineering. Eppan has so much to offer in terms of culture and marvellous sights, but of course also in terms of landscape and nature.