28 November 2024
Ronco, unlike most other destinations featured on this blog, is a place you have probably never ever heard of. I hadn’t either until my good old friends, Sabrina and Kudi, invited me to spend a few days with them before traveling back to Asia. They bought a beautiful house there several years ago and assured me that the view alone was worth the train ride down from Basle to Locarno.
Well, it turns out that they were right. The vast panorama that lay before us, as we stood on the terrace of their home, overlooking the village, was simply stunning. We were ringed by snow-capped mountains, jutting into a cloudless blue sky, and to whose steep sides small villages dotted around the Lago di Maggiore seemed to cling on for dear life.
To our left we could clearly make out Ascona, Losone and Locarno, and to our right, was Italy, less than 10km away. With such a vista, no wonder Ronco is known as the “balcony of Lake Maggiore”. It is a view you can probably never tire of because it is constantly changing depending on the light, from purple sunrises to pinkish-orange sunsets. A huge lightshow orchestrated by Mother Nature herself for our sole pleasure.
Ronco is a medieval village dating back to the 13th century. Its main activities consisted of sheep grazing in the alpine pastures above it as well as wine-growing. Life was tough and many of its inhabitants had to emigrate to find work.
Today, the main activity here is tourism. Indeed, 80% of its inhabitants do not live permanently in the village but have a holiday home there. Its most famous son, the painter, Antonio Ciseri, decorated the alter in the San Martino church where 15th century frescoes of the four seasons can still be admired.
Ronco is the perfect place to spend the rest of your days, if you don’t mind all the steps down to the village; but in sum that is a small price to pay for being surrounded by such outstanding natural beauty as this.
Thank you, guys for your hospitality, enjoy your little piece of heaven on earth and hope to see you both (plus dog) again soon.
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