The Vagabond Hiker

Hiking, trekking, and climbing the world

Hiking Wild Tuscany

Northern Tuscany’s Apennine and rugged limestone Apuan ranges are a world away from the gently rolling hills and vineyards and the madd(en)ing crowds one usually associates with this region. Strangely, until this past month I had never been hiking in Tuscany, confining my brief visits to the tourist meccas of Florence, Siena, and Pisa.

Once again, I booked this one week hiking trip with KE Adventures. We stayed at the lovely Argiturismo Col di Lavacchio for the duration, traveling a few minutes each day to experience some of the best hikes in the area. Join me on this journey, with a surprise bonus at the end.

Col di Lavacchio

The British husband and wife proprietors of this working farm offer guided hiking weeks in the spring and fall, as well as great food and wine in a renovated farmhouse accommodation. As a base for hiking surrounded by nature, it would be difficult to beat. As I was recovering from yet another flare-up of my old nemesis, gout, I enjoyed my first full day here relaxing by the pool, swimming, and strolling some of the many paths at the Agriturismo, rather that participating in the group hike.

Col di Lavacchio Agriturismo
A pool with a view at Col di Lavacchio
Bees on Lamb’s-ear (Stachys byzantina)

Pania di Corfino loop (11.5km and 650m elevation gain)

Monday’s hike in Parco Naturale dell’Orecchiella featured a loop to the summit of Pania di Corfino (Pania means peak in the local vernacular).

Our objective. This photo was taken on our descent.
Canterbury bells (Campanula medium), popular in English cottage gardens since the 16th century
Pania di Corfino summit pano
Rock thyme (Clinopodium alpinum) on the summit
Carthusian pink (Dianthus carthusianorum)

Monte Forato loop from Fornovolasco (12km, 875m elevation gain)

Tuesday’s loop hike from the charming riverside village of Fornovolasco took in an amazing natural arch on the way to the summit with its spectacular views.

Village of Fornovolasco, our trailhead
Wooded mountain view with rock formations during our ascent
The natural arch of Monte Forato
On the summit with Pania della Croce behind, our final objective for the week
The holoparasitic Thyme broomrape (Orobanche alba)
Our KE group on summit ridge. I’m at the back, closest to the edge.
The broad descent gully we took back to Fornovolasco

Monte Maiore loop from Abetone (7km, 275m gain)

As I had kept the rental car from my sojourn near Lago di Garda, I chose to do an alternative hike after our rest/cultural day on Wednesday (which I will explain later in this post). It was only a leisurely morning walk, as can be seen from the stats above, followed by lunch and a stroll around the lovely town of Barga, not far from the Agriturismo.

View towards Monte Lagoni (l) on my wooded Monte Maiore loop hike
Heath spotted-orchid (Dactylorhiza maculata). We saw these on other hikes, but on Monte Maiore there were fields of them.
Knotted crane’s-bill (Geranium nodosum), a species I may not have shown before

Pania della Croce traverse from Piglionico (13 km and 950 m elevation gain)

This fantastic – but difficult – hike to the summit of the “Queen of the Alpi Apuane” provided a fitting culmination of the week. The Apuan Alps are known predominantly for their Carrara marble quarries which disfigure the landscape and pollute the streams. We began with a low-level traverse from the east to the west side of the mountain before the climbing proper began.

View south towards Pania della Croce from Barga’s Duomo di San Cristoforo. (Photo taken two days prior).
PeakFinder view north from the initial low-level traverse of Pania della Croce. I really like this free app, where one can download maps ahead of time, obviating the need for a mobile connection.
Our west-side ascent route, mostly exposed to the sun
Apennine globularia (Globularia incanescens), the favorite flower of our local guide, Manuel, is endemic to northern Tuscany
Distant Mouflon (high zoom photo) Manuel and I saw on our ascent. These are now considered to be a feral subspecies of primitive domestic sheep.
Three on the Pania della Croce summit ridge
Pania della Croce summit. Our leader, Jamie, is on the left here.
The Vagabond Hiker in a reflective mood at the summit marker
Summit view northwest. The Ligurian Sea may be seen in the left background.
View towards the Dead Man feature (that green hump) and our descent route. Can you spot the bright green roof of Rifugio Enrico Rossi? Sadly, it was not open for the season until the following day.
Some of our group descending along the summit ridge (zoom)
Our boulder-infested descent gully. Many found it slow going. (photo from another client)
Almost back! Spot some of our group, circled in red.

That’s it for the hiking portion of the week, but for me there was another attraction during my short time in Tuscany. . .

The 2026 Mille Miglia

The auto enthusiast in me could not resist a (likely) once in a lifetime opportunity to see some of the 400+ historic Mille Miglia (literally, “1000 miles”) cars from 1927 to 1957 in action. Our mid-week rest day coincided with Day 2 of the 5-day historic road rally, which fortuitously went from Padova to Montecatini Termi, with the afternoon hill climb over the Abetone Pass (roughly on the border between Emilia Romagna and Tuscany). A last minute decision to procure a hotel room with terrace overlooking the action in Abetone (about 90 minutes’ spirited drive from our Agriturismo) proved to be brilliant.

1927 Bugatti Type 37
1937 BMW 328
1929 Mercedes Benz 710 SSK
Hotel Regina balcony view at dusk, after most of the action had wound down.

As this blog is posted, my three-week stay in Abruzzo is nearly over. Tomorrow I fly to Madagascar for an Explore Worldwide group trip to that amazing island delayed since 2020 when Covid shut down the world. Unfortunately, it is not the trekking trip I had originally booked, but rather more of a walking nature safari. Nevertheless, I certainly hope to capture some interesting photos for another blog later this summer.

The Vagabond Hiker

Lago di Garda hikes and flowers

Once again I had not planned on posting from my time spent at Lago di Garda in Trentino. But not surprisingly I found aspects of some of my favorite hikes as well as new hikes that I have not covered here before. And of course, since it was May, there were many wildflowers in bloom…

I arrived at my Airbnb in Gavazzo – the same one I stayed at in 2023 – to impending rain. Nonetheless, the balcony view south to northern Lago di Garda was stupendous.

I repeated the Monte Colt & Croce di Ceniga loop from nearby Arco as it is one of my favorites in the area.

Here is the paved approach to Santuaurio della Madonna di Laghel.
Monte Colt summit view to Monte Biaina. It is the only summit in Italy I know with its name etched into the rock.

I have mentioned Massone – Bosco Caproni hikes in the past, but never showed many photos as wooded hikes are difficult to capture. With many trails, though, one could spend weeks and never repeat the exact same hike.

Here is a pano towards Lago di Garda from above the village of Massone.
A path through Bosco Caproni, likely in former times used to move marble from the nearby quarry down to Arco.

A new hike for me from nearby Torbole (just east of Riva del Garda) is the popular Busatte – Tempesta Panoramic Trail loop. I started early mid-week, so only encountered hordes of hikers on the last section of the return.

The lake with Riva del Garda and the Cima Valdez massif. There were spectacular views at every turn and numerous sets of metal stairs on this highly-maintained route.
Crimean iris (Iris lutescens), a new wildflower for this blog.
Poppies, Lago di Garda, and the Cima Della Nara massif
Meadow Clary (Salvia pratensis), a more detailed photo of one previously shown. Native to Europe, it is considered a weed in areas of the US.

Many of my hikes were done simply walking out of my Gavazzo (Tenno) apartment. I extended my 2023 forays farther up into the mountains (as well as to the village of Vigne where the local grocery store now has Amazon lockers!)

Monte San Pietro from the road above Volta di No, less than a 1/2 hour walk from Gavazzo. Many local roads had little or no traffic, and often were gravel or packed dirt.
Balm-leaved Arachangel (Lamium orvala), a better photo of one I have shown before.
Rio Bordellino cascade. I rarely encountered anyone in the forest above my apartment. (In Italian, unlike Spanish, Rio refers to a seasonal stream).
Everlasting Pea (Lathyrus latifolius). Common they may well be, but I liked this photo.
Peach-leaved bellflower (Campanula persicifolia), a species of Campanula I don’t recall having included in my posts before.

Unlike last year when I stayed in Arco with the popular Sarca River walk as my go-to early morning exercise, I did a variant of this hike only once last month.

Multi-use path and valley view with grapevines on my loop walk to Ceniga from Arco along the Fiume Sarca, seen peeking out to the left here.
Gavazzo balcony view at sunrise. I never tired of the views from my Airbnb and would love to return in the future. Critically for the summers is has AC!
  • A note on the photos: this spring I bought a new Samsung Galaxy S25 phone which has a highly capable camera. All photos from this post were taken with that phone rather than my Olympus Tough camera, which will most likely also be the case for future posts.

After a week at an Agriturismo in Tuscany doing a series of group hikes, I have now moved even farther south, to Abruzzo, where I will remain until the first week of July. Some Tuscan hike photos will be posted in two weeks or so.

Enjoy the longer and warmer days outdoors,

The Vagabond Hiker

Day Hikes on Tenerife and Gran Canaria

Rather than spend another couple of months on Lanzarote this past winter, I changed my plans and chose instead to revisit two other Canary Islands that I had only cursorily explored, in the case of Gran Canary, more than 37 years ago! Two center-based group hiking weeks in November fit the bill perfectly, before heading to Southeast Asia and Australia for the winter. As a geography refresher, below is a map of the Canary Islands, located a bit more than 100 kilometers off the coast of Morocco. (Nevertheless, I needed to fly via London Gatwick to get from Marrakech to Tenerife!)

The Canary Islands, a province of Spain
(File:Canarias-rotulado.png. (2025, November 19). Wikimedia Commons.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Canarias-rotulado.png&oldid=1118429016.)

Tenerife

With a land area of about 2000 km2 and a population of nearly 1 million, Tenerife is the largest and most-populous island of the Canary Islands. Visitors are concentrated around its southern towns and beaches, yet just a few kilometers away are some amazing mountain hiking trails. I had only once briefly visited the island, completing two iconic walks following a week in February 2020 hiking on the nearby Island of La Gomera, the subject of a previous blog post. For this trip, I went with a new (to me – it was founded in 1913!) company, HF Holidays. We were based for the first three nights in Santiago del Tiede in the southwest, and for the final four nights in La Laguna in the north of Tenerife.

Santiago del Tiede to San Jose de Los Llanos

16 km with 600 m elevation gain

Prickly pear covered with cochineal, a scale insect used to make the natural dye carmine
Our guide, Guillermo, explaining the life cycle of the endemic biennial Mount Teide bugloss (Echium wildpretii). Earlier in the year this stalk featured bright red flowers.
Landscape with Canarian pine (Pinus canariensis)
Volcanic landscape with pines and Mt Tiede, back right. This was the first of two hikes in Mt Tiede National Park.
A volcanic hill with scattered pines

Erjoz to Cruz de Hilda

9 km with 300 m elevation gain

Banana passionfruit (Passiflora mollissima)
A bold Blue Spotted lizard eyeing my picnic lunch
Our path was along this high ridge in the Macizo de Teno
Vista towards the island of La Palma
Masca village, at 650 m elevation, where we chilled at the end of our hike that day.

Mirador de Samara to Boca Tauce

13 km with 600 m elevation gain

View of the island of La Gomera in “two halves” due to low clouds
Euphorbia with Mt Tiede in the distance. At 3715m, Tiede is the highest mountain in Spain.
Sunset from my hotel room in La Laguna

The astute reader will note that I have only included three hikes from my walking week, rather than the expected five. For at least the third time this past year, plantar fasciitis caused a curtailment of my hiking plans. Fortunately, after several days rest, I suffered no lingering affects and was able to hike the following week on Gran Canaria.

Gran Canaria

As alluded to in my introductory paragraph, I had only once been to Gran Canaria, for a two week spring break back in my late 20’s. Apart from three days bombing around the island in a jeep, my past explorations had been confined to the the pool and beach scenes around the southern fleshpot of Maspalomas. Hence, nearly four decades on, the hiking was all new to me! A 40 minute flight from Tenerife took me to Gran Canaria. Our first lodging with Explore Worldwide was in the lovely town of Agüimes, where I had an extra day to see the sights.

Church of San Sebastian seen from the Plaza del Rosario
Well-behaved youth in the Plaza del Rosario
Courtyard of the local history museum in Agüimes. Our group also spent time in a natural and human history museum during our hike in Guayedeque Canyon. Both museums were fascinating.

Guayedeque Canyon circular from Agüimes

13 km with 500 m elevation gain

Guayedeque Canyon view with aqueduct. As on Tenerife, water is truly life in this arid climate.
Tree houseleek (Aeonium arboreum). Though far larger than the alpine Cobweb houseleek I have featured in past Italy posts, there is nonetheless a clear resemblance.
Cliff-side houses in a rugged landscape
Canary Tree Mallow (Malva acerifolia)
A former cave dwelling. Many limestone caves in this rugged landscape were once inhabited; some still are.
Lunch view from the plateau. The canyon is on the left here, with Agüimes in the right background.

On the Road, part 1

The dramatic bus transfer across the island to our next hike and second lodging was definitely photo-worthy.

Mountain vista
Caldera de los Marteles, near a high vehicular pass
Tree of baroda (Kleinia neriifolia) with Roque Nublo background

Degollada* del Aserrador to La Culata via Roque Nublo

8 km with 400 m elevation gain

Reflections in a lagoon near the start of our traverse. It was a very hazy day, likely due to sand being blown across from the Sahara
Hikers on the basal plateau of Roque Nublo
A hungry lunch companion
My lunch view
The other side of Roque Nublo during our long descent

* Degollada, a Spanish word for “pass,” also means beheaded

Degollada La Aldea to Mogan via Veneguera

12 km with 350 m elevation gain

Landscape with villages in the haze
Our guide, Brian, with a VERY STRANGE creation

On the Road, part 2

After an off day which I used to walk around town and chill by our pool, the following day we headed back across the island to our first hotel, far closer to the airport.

Rugged landscape view back across the mountains. The road is cut into the side of the mountain on the left.
Dramatic Roque Nublo vista from a beautiful but touristy mountain town where we stopped to pick up items for a picnic lunch

Pico de las Nieves to Cruz Grande

8 km with 100 m elevation gain

Forest descent from the Pico de las Nieves, at 1949m the highest point on Gran Canaria.
Still a long way down. With my knees bothering me a bit, along with some others I took a bus ride down the last few km to the town.

I did miss the final hike as I rescheduled my flight to leave earlier back to the UK to give me more time to prepare for my long winter trip.

Completely unrelated to hiking, below is one final photo, taken at Las Palmas airport while waiting for my flight back to Tenerife:

Three Condors of the Day, with apologies to Sydney Pollack and Robert Redford

I am currently at my Airbnb outside of Perth, Western Australia, hiking and planning my 2026 travels. Here is the current list, some items of which are fixed and others still in flux:

  • Feb 10 – March 7: Peninsular Malaysia and Northern Borneo (Sabah)
  • March 7 – 15: Bali, Indonesia
  • March 15 – 23: Hastings, UK
  • March 24 – Apr 29: St. George, Utah
  • April 30 – May 7: Hastings, UK
  • May 7 – July 10: Four weeks each in Arco (Trentino), and Aosta, Italy, with 1 week in Tuscany in between
  • Jul 10 – 17: Hastings, UK
  • July 17 – Aug 1: Madagascar
  • Aug 1 – Sept 3: Hastings and Cornwall/Devon UK (Southwest Coast Path)
  • Sep 3 – Oct 22: Mainly South Africa and Namibia, with short visits to Victoria Falls and a layover in Addis Ababa possible
  • Oct 23 – 31: Hastings, UK
  • Winter 2026-7: My plans are being developed over the next few months

By the way, I am no longer updating the Calendar Tab on this blog site as the amount of effort is simply more than I want to put into it.

The Vagabond Hiker

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