On Solitude and the Stelvio
A Morning Drive Without Witnesses

I left Boario Terme early, before the day had properly begun.

The roof was already down. It was not particularly warm, but that was part of the reason for leaving so early: cold air, empty roads and the feeling of having the mountains almost entirely to myself.

The Porsche had been quiet during the first few kilometres. The flat-six was still warming up and there was no reason to rush. Outside the towns, the road began to narrow and climb towards Passo del Vivione. The air changed first. It smelled of damp earth, pine trees and grass. Then came the light, breaking unevenly through the woods and moving across the road as the trees opened and closed around it.

Vivione is not a road for showing off. It is narrow, irregular and occasionally feels as though it was built for another century. You cannot force your way through it. You have to pay attention, look beyond every bend and let the car move naturally beneath you.

With the roof down, everything feels closer. The stone walls, the water running beside the road, the smell of the forest and the sudden drop in temperature each time the route disappears into the shade.

Then there is the sound.

The 718 Boxster GTS 4.0 does not need to be loud all the time. At lower revs, the engine sits behind you with a deep and restrained voice. But when the road opens and the revs begin to rise, its character changes completely. The sound becomes harder, clearer and more urgent. It fills the space behind your shoulders and then returns from the mountainsides a fraction of a second later.

Every tunnel becomes difficult to resist.

From Vivione, I continued towards Passo Gavia. The forest gradually became thinner and the landscape more exposed. Grey rock, open sky and the sharp morning air replaced the softer colours of the valley.

The Gavia demands concentration. There are sections where the road feels barely wide enough for one car, and the absence of barriers makes you very aware of where you are. It is not frightening, but it asks for respect.

The Porsche felt completely at home there. Not because of its power, but because of its size, balance and precision. The steering tells you exactly what is happening beneath the front wheels, and the car never feels larger than the road around it. On those passes, that matters far more than outright speed.

After passing through Bormio, I continued towards the Stelvio, climbing from the Prato side.

This is the image everyone knows: the endless sequence of hairpins carved into the mountain, each one sitting almost directly above the previous one. From a distance, it looks impossible. From behind the wheel, it becomes a question of rhythm.

Brake. Turn. Let the car rotate. Accelerate briefly. Then begin again.

The road was almost empty. For long stretches, there was nobody ahead of me and nobody in the mirrors. No group waiting at the summit, no photographers standing beside the bends and no audience for the sound of the engine.

Just the car, the mountain and the next corner.

There was something unusually peaceful about it. We often imagine these roads as places of excitement and performance, but driving the Stelvio alone in the morning felt more private than dramatic. There was no need to prove anything and nowhere else to be.

I could hear the tyres working on the surface, the wind moving through the cabin and the engine breathing behind me. My hair was a mess, my hands were cold and I had stopped checking the time.

At the top, I parked and ordered a sandwich with venison sausage and sauerkraut. Nothing refined, but exactly right after several hours on the road. I ate outside, looking back towards the bends I had just climbed.

Later that afternoon, the character of the journey changed completely.

I left the Porsche in the valley and took the cable car up to the Vigilius Mountain Resort. After a day built around sound and movement, arriving somewhere accessible only by cable car felt almost unreal. Within a few minutes, the engine, the traffic and the road had disappeared.

There was only silence.

I walked through the woods around San Vigilio, spent some time in the spa and ended the day with dinner overlooking the mountains. The air still carried the smell of timber and grass, but everything felt slower now. Even the light seemed to remain on the peaks longer than it should.

The following day was less intense. I drove part of the Great Dolomites Road without trying to recreate the morning before. The roads were wider, the landscape brighter and the pace naturally more relaxed.

It was simply another day with the roof down, moving between valleys, rock faces and small mountain villages before returning to Vigilius for dinner at Restaurant 1500.

Two days of driving can seem like a small thing. A route on a map, a hotel reservation and a list of mountain passes.