Forty mountain huts in the Dolomites have put up a simple donations box for visitors, as part of the campaign launched by the Microart social promotion association to encourage hikers to give three Euros each to support initiatives to restore the area after Storm Vaia. Among these is #SOSerrai – 1 million for the Serrai, the fund launched by the UNESCO Dolomites Foundation to help rebuild the path through the Serrai di Sottoguda gorge.
To help the wounded mountain
Clean up the trail. This is the name of the Microart project, which aims to raise 20,000 Euros for Cai Veneto, Sat di Primiero and Cai di Cimolais. Part of this money will go towards rebuilding the trail that links Sottoguda, in the Municipality of Rocca Pietore (BL), to Malga Ciapela and then to Mount Marmolada. The restoration work will cost several million Euros, one million of which needs to be raised through public donations. This is certainly an ambitious goal, but if you visit the website: soserrai.dolomitiunesco.info (where you’ll find all the information about the #SOSerrai campaign) you’ll see that 412,000 Euros has already been raised. We are therefore now close to the half-way mark and every contribution, including every three-Euro donation to Clean up the Trail, can prove decisive in achieving our goal. This is to carry out a project that will withstand the impact of climate change, enhance the site from the geological and scenic point of view, and make it once more accessible to the elderly, the disabled, and families with children: a feature that previously made it one of the leading lights in the Accessible Dolomites project.
The importance of signs
For every donation, hikers will receive a free pendant made from the wood of fallen trees, and decorated with micro-photographs of dolomitic rocks. These images were produced by the Professor Bernardo Cesare of the University of Padua using a polarised light microscope and printed on wood by the Mase Press Srl graphic studio. This symbolic gift has been made by dedicated Microart volunteers, who have personally collected the timber, and cut, drilled and packaged each disk. The regeneration can include such simple gestures that carry greater meaning.
Where and how to donate
You can find the list of the 40 refuges that belong to the “Clean up the Trail” project by visiting: www.microartrock.com. Donations to #SOSerrai in particular will be collected at the following mountain huts: Città di Fiume (Pelmo), Treviso Canali (Pale di San Martino) and Falier (Marmolada). You can find information about making a donation from home at: soserrai.dolomitiunesco.info
