S MAGAZINE ★ 4 AUGUST 2019 33
Edited by Laura Mulley
pushing himself further and faster as the
afternoons wore on.
You can choose to dine with your children,
or they can join the gang at a supervised
kids’ table, though most families ate together.
One evening there was a gala dinner – we had
to give Fred an iPad so he would sit still and
eat tomato pasta while Alex and I tucked into
eight courses: creamy panna cotta burrata
with tomato jelly, asparagus with lobster foam,
prosecco mousse with elderberry espuma
(aka more foam).
Other meals involved fabulous spreads
of food to serve yourself. I’m still working off
the visible effects of the strudel buffet.
The hotel’s bedrooms are stylish, spacious
and entirely wood clad, which gives them
a wonderful sauna-like aroma – probably
enhanced while we were there (in June) by
the heatwave that had hit mainland Europe,
sending the mercury to 35ºC. It was clearly
unusual as the accommodation has no
air-con. We slept with our balcony doors flung
wide and soaked up the silence – you couldn’t
hear a car for miles.
Our final night passed in the deckchairs
on our balcony, which provided panoramic
views of the valley. Watching the sun set as
swifts and swallows dove through the air in
search of dinner was an act of mindfulness in
itself. We may have only stayed three nights
but the restorative benefits felt like we’d
enjoyed a three-week break.
Amy PackerLap up the high life at
a South Tyrolean farm
that’s perfect for families
Peak practice
A
s lunch spots go, enjoying a bowl of
meaty Goulash Tirolese and polenta
while sitting in the shadow of a
mountain which has, unusually, not
one but two slate-grey summits, felt
pretty hard to beat.
My husband Alex, our three year old, Freddie,
and I were on our first trip to South Tyrol,
staying in a stunning alpine-style lodge on
the edge of the Dolomites. We had signed
up for a family nature walk and been whisked
to a mountain cabin by tractor-trailer, much
to Fred’s delight.
When it comes to scouting picture-perfect
locations, our destination ticked all the
boxes. The hut sits on the edge of a babbling,
glacial river, a sea of pine trees and exquisite
wild flowers on its banks and the ice-covered
Peitlerkofel as its backdrop, touching the
clouds at almost 3,000 metres.
What couldn’t be captured for Instagram was
the sweet, clear air; the smell of damp pine
needles; the warmth of high-altitude sunshine
on your skin, tempered only by the cool breeze
whistling down from the summit. It’s the sort of
air that feels like it’s clearing decades of living
in London from your lungs with each inhalation.
If I’m honest, we originally thought we
were to holiday in Austria, having flown into
Innsbruck Airport and been told the hotel was
just a 50-minute drive. Almost two hours later
we had crossed the border into Italy and
arrived at Hotel Sonnwies. Only just launched
to the UK market, we were the only Brits there
that week but even the Italian holidaymakers
we met agreed South Tyrol felt nothing like the
Italy they knew. The region is bilingual and
everything from the food to the staff seemed
more Germanic than Roman.
Sonnwies is a family-run, organic farm that
has evolved into a four-star “Familienhotel”
where kids come first, but the grown-ups most
definitely haven’t been forgotten. For those who
want it, there are 10 hours of free childcare
every day – think pony rides, face painting,
zip wires, rock climbing and feeding the farm
animals. There’s also a sizeable soft play area
for burning off energy pre-bed – essential
once your preschooler works out there’s an
ice-cream cart in the lobby that he can help
himself to at any time. We lost hours in the
hotel’s (five) swimming pools, Fred slowly
building up courage on the water slides,Sonnwies (+39 04724 13533, sonnwies.com)
offers rooms from £340 per night based
on two adults and two children sharing on an
all-inclusive basis.Freddie checks
out the poolSuites at
Sonnwies are
pure luxuryAbove: Sonnwies
alpine lodge with
its panoramic views●S