Hill, Mountain

Pollone – Alpetto Superiore

Departure from Pollone, we head towards the center of the village passing through Piazza San Rocco and taking Via dei Caduti for the Patria.

Here starts our path D41 towards the Alpetto Superiore from which on clear days you can see the flooded rice fields, the church of San Gaudenzio di Novara, the two cones of the abandoned nuclear power plant of Trino, the hill of Superga and the Monviso.

Keep left at the junction and follow the signs for San Barnaba, a small but pretty church just above Pollone, easily accessible on foot.

Once you reach the last houses of Pollone, the path will be on our left, just beyond this parking lot. From here you can reach San Barnaba through a didactic path very suitable for children following the families to enjoy the contact with nature, also learning the names of the main plants that cover these lands.

San Barnaba is an excellent oasis of rest that offers visitors the possibility of an outdoor picnic, but also a life path created by the municipality with the slogan “Health Walk” where to practice healthy outdoor sports.

Continuing always on the path that leads to Tracciolino, we will soon grind a slight difference in altitude, crossing steep paved roads, white roads, meadows and paths under the beech trees.

Pay particular attention to a fork just before you get to the meadows; as indicated on the map you have to keep to the right just after a bench on the path.

The last stretch before reaching the Tracciolino road is practically in the middle of a meadow, not very well marked, but following the signs on some rocks you reach the first part of our itinerary.

Keeping left on the Tracciolino road, after a few hundred meters you will reach a steep paved road that leads to the Alpetto Superiore and further north to Poggio Frassati.

The succession of hairpin bends will not give us breath for a few km but will guarantee us a special view over the whole of Biella, with some characteristic points in the foreground, such as the Graglia Sanctuary and the Burcina Park.

The view from the top is unparalleled. The boundless space in front of us makes us want to have wings to free ourselves in the sky and see from above all the panorama below.

For the return we choose to make a ring and go down from Locanda Le Piane, through a paved road rather than dirt, reducing the difficulty. To take the path, keep to the right to Tracciolino and continue for about a km until a fork on the left that will lead us to the only refreshment point with fountain.

The slope is still important, but it allows us to get to the valley much more quickly than the outgoing taking San Grato in front of us and the Sanctuary of Graglia on our right and being able to admire them more and more clearly.

Almost at the end of the paved part we will have to pay attention again to the height of some recently renovated houses because immediately after there will be to take the path D51 in the undergrowth that is little signposted and partly damaged.

This leads to a farm where we met a young small dog who wanted to play and for a while we thought to make him our mascot.

Now close to the goal with the last ups and downs, we come across a small fork forced because of some dogs not tied and without owners nearby. We point out the point on the map, pay attention since even some locals in the village told us to avoid the area. We then continue towards San Barnaba until we reach Via Benedetto Croce to end your tour in beauty.