A STORY SPANNING OVER 50 YEARS
Stainless steel cutlery
From Adelina’s memoirs:
"...during the summer we went haymaking on the meadows of Malga Ciapela. I was a little girl then. One weekend my mother went down to the village and left me in the care of our next-door neighbours, the family of the one who later become my husband. When I sat down at the table I was particularly struck by the gleaming stainless steel cutlery. A real luxury in those days that made an even greater impression in the rustic chalet environment of the tabiè. In my home we used iron cutlery that went rusty in no time at all.”
The story of Hotel La Montanara started in 1961 with the marriage of Adelina De Biasio and Guerino Dell’Antone, both from Sottoguda. Adelina worked in the fields, tending the livestock and looking after the in-laws, her aged grandmother and, in 1962, her new-born baby Loretta, while Guerino worked at his building business. Toward the mid-1960s Guerino sensed the potential of Sottoguda and the enchanting Gola dei Serrai as a holiday resort, also given the recently-built, futuristic-looking Marmolada cable lift. With a budget of just 300,000 lire (about 150 euro) he started laying the bricks for what would become a bar, helped at the end of the working day by his wife.
La Montanara opened its doors in 1964, the same year their second child Valerio, the artist of the family, was born. The new bar soon came to symbolise all the vitality and joy of that era, a meeting place for the locals, including those returning after long spells working abroad. Drink a glass of red wine, known locally as an ombra, listen to a bit of music from the brand new jukebox, tell jokes, dance and challenge each other to interminable sessions of the card game bàten, these all added up to carefree moments of pure joy for all who frequented the bar. With the advent of the first tourists, Adelina was finally able to indulge her true passion, cooking, a passion cultivated during numerous seasons in Cortina.
Imagination, enthusiasm and the dedication of a family working together, favoured by a period of economic prosperity, were the ingredients that enabled La Montanara to risk an upgrade, in 1972 changing from a bar to a hotel, after some major extension work.
In 1978, coinciding with the birth of their third child Francesco, Guerino left his wife to reign supreme over the house while he threw himself heart and soul into the art of the pizza. A tireless worker with a dynamic, versatile personality, Nino soon built the pizzeria with its essential wood-fired oven from which his fragrant creations would emerge and before very long he was attracting a great many admirers to Sottoguda. As well as running the pizzeria La Tirolese, Nino never lost his love for the authentic local products gifted by nature and he continued to raise rabbits, turkeys, a pig and chickens and kept bees for their honey.
Sharing with our guests the joy of experiencing all the wonders the mountain environment has to offer has been our prime motivation for over 50 years.
