Monte Grappa
Monte Grappa glares out over the Veneto plains much in the same way that Mont Ventoux looms large over the Rhône Valley. Extending 30 kilometres from the banks of the Piave river – almost to the Brenta – Il Grappa dominates the skyline from Venice to Vicenza, its features as dark and inscrutable as its history, its moods as fickle as its weather.
For cyclists, the mountain has also become a magnet. Every weekend, at least in summer, it morphs into an anthill, swarming with fanatical local cyclists on each of its nine ascents.