Who said that to organize trips away from Milan do you need a car? Certainly not Pierre D’Alfonso, half Milanese and half Aosta Valley, who loved the trekking and travel by train, he founded the project which has its mission in its name: Away from Milan.
Via Da Milan for local tourism
Pierre D’Alfonso, after 2020, decided to share his passion and his little treasure: all those routes that can be traveled by train – starting from the Lombard capital – to reach areas where you can make trekking. Via Da Milano is a proximity tourism project that was born from a consideration: «I realized that there is little knowledge of what is around Milan and those who deal with tourism always suggest the usual destinations». Pierre, on the other hand, has shared many itineraries on his website, some already existing, but many others traced by himself. Some are circular, other times they lead from one station to another.
«I make them and redo them; I study them and if they don’t convince me I don’t include them” it happened for example with the Cammino dei Laghi Briantei, he tells us: “Nice, but the train times are inconvenient, the service is terrible. My itineraries must be accessible to everyone». After experiences abroad, including one in Romania for an organization that works on sustainability projects, social economy and the inclusion of people with disabilities, Pierre returned to Milan where he now works as a support teacher. At the beginning he focused on treks within 100 km of Milan and reachable by train or train plus bus, but now Via Da Milano also includes some more distant paths.
Via Da Milan, beyond the usual destinations
«There are routes of different difficulty and there is not only the mountain, but also plains and hills. The truth is that many paths are not exploited because they are completely unknown: take the Oltrepo Pavese, for example, everyone knows it for its wine, but not for its beautiful trekking or cycling routes.” The mapping of him is driven by the will to raise awareness of sustainable mobility and bring out other destinations in addition to the best-known ones: «What’s the point of still talking about and promoting places like Varenna and Bellagio?» you ask. We too have asked ourselves this several times, in fact, and this is a concrete answer to those who want to discover the area, to those who want to get away from the city, at least on weekends and to those who love walking.
On the site, routes are mapped on active railways, others on abandoned railways – often converted into cycle-pedestrian paths – and others abandoned. Because Pierre’s interest in railways remains primary. For each route that he publishes on the site, in addition to sharing useful information for those wishing to replicate the tour, there is always also an extensive description of the place and the birth of the railway line.
We asked him to point us out 10 treks to do this spring and you can find them below, in the gallery.
