Cortina d'Ampezzo: Ski area guide

Cortina d’Ampezzo is the most prestigious ski area in the Veneto Dolomites and a symbol of Italian alpine skiing around the world. Set among the sheer walls of the Tofane, Cristallo and Faloria, the Queen of the Dolomites has built its reputation over almost a century of Olympic, social and sporting history unmatched anywhere in the Italian Alps.

Olympic history

Cortina’s ties with the Olympic Games run long and deep. In 1956 it hosted the VII Winter Olympics, the first Games ever held in Italy. The event transformed the resort and gave it the infrastructure that shaped the following decades.

In 2021, in the middle of the pandemic, Cortina was back in the spotlight with the Alpine World Ski Championships, raced in front of empty stands but broadcast worldwide. The circle closed with the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, when the Ampezzo basin hosted the women’s alpine skiing races and the bobsleigh and skeleton events at the fully renovated Cortina Sliding Centre. Very few alpine resorts in the world have a record like that.

The 2026 lifts

The Olympic works left Cortina with a lift set to change how people get around the mountain: the new Son dei Prade-Bai de Dones gondola. It links the town centre directly to the Tofane slopes and takes much of the traffic off the roads that used to clog the resort at peak times. The ten-seat cabins carry 2,400 people per hour, with the latest standards of comfort and quietness.

At the same time, the Cortina Sliding Centre was completely rebuilt to meet the technical requirements of the international bobsleigh and skeleton federation. It remains in use after the Games as a European reference venue for ice sports.

The ski area

Cortina’s 120 km of runs are spread across five separate sectors: Faloria, Cinque Torri, Lagazuoi, Tofane and Socrepes. The skiing is very varied.

Overall, the ski area leans towards intermediate and advanced skiers. The Tofane runs are among the most technical in the Dolomites, while the Socrepes slopes are far more forgiving for beginners.

One thing to bear in mind: the five sectors are not all linked on the slopes. To get from Faloria to Cinque Torri, for example, you use the free ski buses included in the ski area. Far from being a drawback, this gives each sector its own identity and keeps the number of skiers on each one down.

Cortina as a destination

Cortina is much more than a ski resort. Corso Italia, the famous pedestrian street in the centre, is the drawing room of Italian winter sports: international fashion boutiques, historic cafés such as Lovat and Pasticceria Alverà, Michelin-starred restaurants and a social buzz that attracts a select international crowd.

Prices are among the highest in Italy, for both accommodation and food. But if you want the full mountain experience together with high-end alpine glamour, what Cortina offers more than justifies the cost.

Getting there

• By car from Venice: the A27 motorway, about ninety minutes in normal conditions.
• By air: the Cortina Express coach links Venice Marco Polo airport directly with the centre of the resort.
• From Bolzano: the SS51 through the Puster Valley and the Ampezzo valley, about an hour and a half.