Schnalstal

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Schnalstal below the reservoir, view of Vernagt and Unser Frau
The valley above the reservoir

The Schnalstal , also simply Schnals ( Italian Val Senales ), is an orographically left side valley of the upper Adige Valley or Vinschgau in South Tyrol . It starts near Naturns and stretches roughly 20 kilometers to the northwest into the Ötztal Alps , where it ends at the main Alpine ridge or Schnals ridge . For the most part it belongs administratively to the municipality of Schnals . Juval Castle stands in an exposed position above the narrow entrance to the valley .

valley

View of the Vinschgau near Naturns from the south: the entrance to the Schnalstal in the middle of the picture
Vernagt reservoir, panorama

The valley is traversed by the Schnalser Bach , which is dammed in the upper part of the valley to the Vernagt reservoir . In this area the maximum limits of the mountain farming settlements are reached, the Finailhöfe ( 1953  m ) count (t) s among the highest grain farms in the Alps.

Like only a few comparable regions, the Schnalstal shows climatic and vegetation areas from apple and viticulture to high alpine glaciers at a relatively short distance .

At the end of the valley in the Kurzras winter sports resort is one of the oldest and largest cable cars in South Tyrol , the Schnalstaler Gletscherbahnen . The Schnalstal ski area has over 35 km of slopes and ranges from 2011  m to 3212  m and is a member of the Ortler Ski Arena . It is partly a glacier ski area, so you could ski on some lifts all year round until summer skiing was stopped in 2013.

Numerous hiking trails are available for mountain hikers. We particularly recommend the hikes from the Vernagt reservoir via the Tisenhof mountain farm ( 1814  m ), documented in 1306, to the Similaunhütte ( 3019  m , private), from Kurzras to the Schöne Aussicht refuge ( Rifugio Bella Vista ( 2842  m ), private) and through the Pfossental , a side valley of Schnalstal that is only partially used, to the (ice-free) Eisjöchl .

The glacier mummy Ötzi was found on the Tisenjoch, above the Schnalstal valley . There is an active and open-air museum on the subject, the ArcheoParc Schnals in the village of Our Lady .

In the north and east, large parts of the valley flanks in the Texel Group Nature Park are under protection.

Localities and communities

The village of Our Lady, the pilgrimage church at the bottom right
Karthaus parliamentary group with old monastery wall, August 2010

The following localities belonging to the Schnals municipality are located in Schnalstal :

The valley entrance area, which only offers space for a few farmsteads, is divided between the communities of Naturno and Kastelbell-Tschars .

history

The valley has prehistoric and prehistoric finds, but has come into the focus of further archaeological investigations mainly thanks to the spectacular discovery of the " Iceman ". The establishment of permanent settlements is primarily the result of the high medieval internal colonization , which in Schnalstal owes itself in particular to the initiative of the noble free von Wangen, the Vinschgauer lords of Montalban ( Guelph ministerial ) and the Carthusian monastery Allerengelberg , founded in the 14th century .

Ecclesiastically, the outer Schnalstal belongs to the parish of Naturno , but there are separate parish offices in Karthaus, Katharinaberg and Unser Frau.

In the 1960s, the columnist Hellmut von Cube captured his impressions of a largely archaic world of the Schnalstal farmers in satirical prose sketches.

Others

Shaft drive from the Hochjoch to Schnalstal

The Schnalstaler Gletscherbahn was built in the early 1970s at the instigation and personal commitment of the ski area pioneer Leo Gurschler (1947–1983). The highest cable car in South Tyrol opened in July 1975 (mountain station at 3212  m ). In May 1982 Gurschler had to file for bankruptcy with his hotel and vacation rental business, which had also been established in the late 1970s. The exact circumstances that led to the bankruptcy have never been fully clarified. The 36-year-old committed suicide in October 1983. In his hometown Kurzras a memorial was erected in his honor in September 2007 in Gurschler's honor.

The Ötztal sheep drive , which takes place four times a year, enables sheep farmers from Schnalstal and Vinschgau to use their grazing rights in the rear Ötztal above Vent . In June and September, thousands of sheep are driven over two routes over a distance of up to 44 km with a 3,200 m rise in altitude and 1,800 m descent over the Ötztal main ridge to the summer pasture areas. The passage is dangerous for animals and shepherds. In 2011, this tradition was recognized by the Austrian UNESCO Commission as a national intangible cultural heritage under the name Transhumance - Shaft drives in the Ötztal Alps . The Italian UNESCO does not keep such a directory for the time being.

The 14th stage of the Giro d'Italia in Schnalstal ended on May 27, 1995 with the victory of the Colombian Oliverio Rincón .

Das sinstere Tal , an Austrian-German feature film from 2014 based on the novel by Thomas Willmann, was shot in winter 2012/2013 in essential sequences in Kurzras , on the farms of Marchegg and Kofel.

literature

  • Hellmut von Cube: My life with the trolls. A South Tyrol satire from the sixties. With a foreword by Herbert Rosendorfer . Bolzano: Raetia 2008. ISBN 978-88-7283-321-6
  • Franz Huter : The Schnals valley in the Ötztal Alps. History and present. In: Ders .: Selected essays on the history of Tyrol (Schlern-Schriften 300). Innsbruck: Wagner 1997, pp. 220-224.
  • Andreas Putzer: The role of high alpine landscape for prehistoric communities - The case study Schnals . In: Incontri annuali di preistoria e protostoria 7 (2019), pp. 38-40.

Web links

Commons : Schnalstal  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The history of a ski area in South Tyrol. ( January 6, 2011 memento in the Internet Archive ) Retrieved December 13, 2010.
  2. ↑ a b c Leo Gurschler and the sports village Kurzras. Memorandum (PDF; 6 pages, undated; 87 kB). Retrieved December 13, 2010.
  3. ↑ Schnalstal: bankrupt vultures over the glacier. In: Zeit Online / Die Zeit , July 9, 1982. Accessed June 12, 2011
  4. ↑ Hans Dieter Schmoll: World Cable Car History. 1945-2000. Volume 2, Steidl-Verlag, Eugendorf near Salzburg 2000, ISBN 3-9501344-0-9 , pp. 84–85: “Schnalstal - or the glacier king who was too young.” (Quoted in alpinforum.com: Leo Gurschler and the Schnalstaler Glacier. March 15, 2004. Accessed December 13, 2010.)
  5. ^ Monument in memory of Leo Gurschler. In: Der Vinschger, 30/07, September 5, 2007. Retrieved December 13, 2010.
  6. ^ Karl-Heinz Rochlitz: Schnalstal. Tappeiner Verlag.
  7. ↑ Elke Wasmund: Django Alpinus ( Memento from January 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) In: Der Vinschger Wind, Heft 5, 2013, March 7, 2013, p. 18 f.

Coordinates: 46 ° 42 ′ 25 ″  N , 10 ° 54 ′ 36 ″  E