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The typical road Via Claudia Augusta has its origins with the Celts. It connects
northern Italy with
southern Germany and was in antiquity the easiest way to cross the Alps.
The Romans, at the time under Nero Claudius Drusus, used the existing Celtic routes for travel; Nero's son,
Claudius, then expanded the road into a trade route and named it "Via Claudia Augusta" - in mermory of his father.
The first real road over the Alps strechtes over 700 km from the
Danube, through the Fernpass, further over the highest point at the
Reschenpass, through the Vinschgau valley, to the spa town of
Merano, where Empress Sissi had already been a guest. It then passes through the capital of South Tyrol - Bolzano - and continues to Trento, where the road split. The western part leads through Verona to the Po Valley near Ostiglia (Hostilia), while the eastern part, also called the Via Claudia Augusta Altinate, goes through Feltre to the
Adriatic at Altinum.
Highlights along the Via Claudia Augusta in the Vinschgaue valley
The curch tower at Lake
Resia, the Benedictine monastery of
Marienberg above Burgeis, the medieval town of
Glurns, the
Churburg, Lasa marble, the Messner Mountain Museum at
Juval Castle, the Curch of
St. Proculus in Naturns, a replica of a Roman milestone in Rabland, a Roman inscription in Partschins, Töll - the former Roman customs station, and the Trauttmansdorff throne (viewpoint in Algund). Today, the highlights of the Via Claudia Augusta can be explored along the
"Etsch Cycle Path" or the "Vinschgau Cycle Path".