Cortina d'Ampezzo

No resort wears scenery like Cortina. The town sits in a wide, sunny basin ringed by the Tofane, Cristallo and Faloria massifs — sheer Dolomite walls that blush pink and orange at dusk, a spectacle the locals call enrosadira. Cortina hosted the 1956 Winter Olympics, the first Games ever broadcast on television, and in 2026 the world returns: the women's alpine events run on the legendary Olympia delle Tofane, where World Cup racers have thundered through the rock-walled Tofana Schuss for decades.

The skiing splits into distinct sectors — broad, sunny cruising on the Tofane, panoramic terrace skiing at Faloria, and the wild, quiet Cinque Torri area facing the front line of World War I, where restored trenches sit beside the pistes. It is all stitched into the vast Dolomiti Superski network, so one pass unlocks a dozen valleys.

Then there is the town itself: Corso Italia at dusk is a promenade of fur coats, climbing legends and espresso bars. Cortina has always been as much about being in the mountains as skiing them — Hemingway wintered here, and Hollywood keeps coming back.